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LECTURES 



ENGLISH HISTORY 



TEAGIC POETRY. 



AMS PRESS 

NEW YORK 



LECTURES 



ON 



ENGLISH HISTORY 



TRAGIC POETRY, 



AS ILLUSTKATED BY SIIAKSPEARE. 



BY 

IIE^S^RY EEED, 

LATE PROFESSOR IX TIIE U.N I VjA'siTY OF PENNSYLVANIA - 



' Dramatica est veUiti Historia BpecUbilia ; nam constituit imaginem rcrum tanquam prcsentium : Historla, 
autcm, tanquam praeteritarum."— £acon, de Augm. Sc. lib. ii. ch. xiii. 



PHILADELPHIA: 
PARRY & M^M I L L AN, 

SUCCESSORS TO A. nART, latb CAREY & HAKT. 

1855 



<^h 



a^QM f<\K 



Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data 

Reed, Henry, 1808-1854. 

Lectures on English history and tragic poetry. 

Reprint of the 1855 ed. published by Parry & 
McMillan, Philadelphia. 

1. Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616-Histories. 
2. Shakespeare, William, 1564-1616-Tragedies. 
I. Title. 

PR2982.R4 1974 822.3'3 72-174305 
ISBN 0-404-05234-7 



Reprinted from the edition of 1855, Philadelphia 
First AMS edition published in 1974 
Manufactured in the United States of America 

AMS PRESS INC. 

NEW YORK, N.Y. 10003 



CIP 16 DEC 1974 



INTRODUCTION. 



The uuccess of the first series of Mr. Reed's Lectures on 
English Literature, has tempted me to a new experiment on 
the kindness of the public. This volume comprises two 
courses on kindred subjects — one delivered in 1846, on the 
Historical Plays of Shakspeare — from the dim legendary pe- 
riod, when scarcely the form of history is maintained, down 
to the edge of the poet's own day and generation, the reign 
of Henry the Eighth — the other, a very brief one on Tragic 
Poetry, in 1842. The first course was prepared for the 
smaller class of the College Chapel ; and the second, which 
was by comparison very highly elaborated, for a more popu- 
lar audience. With this latter course Mr. Reed took great 
pains, and had reason to be content with the result; for 
they were listened to with delight by a most intelligent 
audience, and added much to his local reputation. Both 
will, I am sure, be read with great pleasure, though of them, 
as of all these posthumous works, it is but fair to say that 
they are in want of the critical revision which the author 
alone could have given, and must be read, not as carefuUy- 
•wTitten essays, but as spoken discourses intended more for 
the ear than the eye. Practically, there *5 good reason in 

i 



4 INTRODUCTION. 

Sydney Smith's distinction, if not as to the greater care 
necessary, at least as to the greater care usually taken in 
what is written to be read than in what is written to be 
spoken. Mr. Reed wrote, not carelessly, but very rapidly. 
In one of his private letters (to many of which, by-the-by, I 
have referred in the notes to this volume) he thus describes 
not only his mode of composition, with its attendant embar- 
rassments, but the feeling almost of enthusiasm which his 
theme often excited: — "Since you were here," he writes, " a 
very busy man have I been — perpetually haunted by the 
writing of one lecture a week, and usually not being able to 
finish it till about an hour before it was wanted. This has 
been a severity on one who likes to compose vdth a leisurely 
thoughtfulness. I have just got through the Shakspeare 
part of my course, with a lecture on Hamlet yesterday even- 
ing. I could scarcely have conceived how much my reveren- 
tial admiration —wonder at the genius of the myriad-minded 
one — has deepened by this kind of study of his dramas — 
' in the lowest deep, a lower deep.' John Milton is before 
me in av^ul majesty for Monday next." 

Thus he wrote and felt when poetical study occupied his 
mind; and, though this letter does not refer to these courses 
of lectures, but to one other more extended on the British 
Poets, which I yet hope to give to the public, I have quoted 
it in some measure to account for slight inaccuracies — the 
fruit of haste, and also as a revelation of the earnest and 
thoughtful spirit that influenced him throughout. His was 
:ihe heart of a most devout poetical student. 

Of the first course of lectures on English History as illus- 
trated by Shakspeare, I need only say, in addition to the 



INTRODUCTION 6 

explanations of the Introductory Lecture, that this mode of 
historical writing is entirely new. With the exception of 
some fugitive essays in English magazines — the object of 
which was to show how wrong Shakspeare was — I am aware 
of nothing of the kind in the language. How the idea of 
using Shakspeare's plays, in Lord Bacon's phrase, as "His- 
toria spectabilis,'' is developed, the indulgent reader must 
determine, bearing in mind throughout, that the drama is 
not used merely as a mode of illustrating historical records 
or lightening their gravity, not as a means of entertainment 
and relief, but as an instrument of deep philosophy in com- 
bining two great departments of human thought and know- 
ledge too often dissociated. " I seek," to use Mr. Reed's 
words, "this combination, not so much as a means of re- 
lieving the severity of historical study and making it more 
attractive, as because I have a deep conviction that poetry 
has a precious power of its own for the preservation of 
historical truth ; that it can so revivify the past — can put 
such life into it, as to make it imperishable." The attempt 
is now before the reading public. 

In editing this volume I have added a few notes, and 
in them have, in several instances, availed myself of my 
brother's private correspondence. It is of so interest- 
ing a nature — so varied, and, as with every thing he 
wrote, so characteristic, and transparent to his pure tastes 
and gentle nature, that I am inclined to promise, at no very 
distant day, a memoir of his life and correspondence. I 
speak doubtfully ; for, though among his family and inti- 
mate friends every hour of desolate separation, with its sad 
thoughts and memories, is less tolerable, (and I write these 



6 INTRODUCTION. 

words at the distance of more than a year from the day of 
the sacrifice of the Arctic,) such a step must very much de- 
pend on the favour with which these volumes are received 
by the public. 

Down to this point of time, as I have said, the publication 
of Mr. Reed's works has been eminently successful ; the 
Lectures on English Literature having passed through seve- 
ral editions — three in this country, and at least one in a 
«heap form in Great Britain. Rarely has an unheralded 
book been more kindly received both at home and abroad. 
I have not seen the English edition, which I understand to 
he in the form of what is known as "Railway reading." It 
Has, of course, been printed without regard to the American 
copyright, afi'ording in a small but very striking way (for 
here, those who are wronged are the widow and orphan) 
an illustration of the discreditable condition of the law be- 
tween the two countries, the responsibility for which, I am 
Borry to say, rests on my own countrymen. I am the more 
free to express this opinion, recollecting, as I do most dis- 
tinctly, how strong were my brother's feelings — how in- 
tensely he felt, as a matter of American self-reproach, 
the want or the denial of international copyright. 

In preparing this volume for the press, I am glad to make 
my acknowledgements for great assistance rendered to me 
by Professor George Allen — one of my brother's colleagues 
at the University of Pennsylvania. W. B. R. 

October 9, 1855. 



CONTENTS. 



LECTURES ON ENGLISH HISTORY. 
LECTURE L— INTRODUCTORY. 

ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 

Shakspeare's Chronicle-Plays — Legendary history : King Lear — 
Roman and Saxon: Cymbeline and Macbeth — Nature of the 
subject generally — Imaginative history defined — Not historical 
romance — Power of Imagination in historical painting — Arch- 
bishop Whateley's analysis — Lord Bacon's idea of dramatic 
poetry — Milton's Vision of Greece, in Paradise Regained — 
Sense of reality — Famines as described in history and poetry 
— Genoa in 1799 — Ghent in the fourteenth century — Philip 
Van Artavelde — Archdeacon Hare — Remote and obscure le- 
gends — Reality too distinct — Images and memories of the dead 
— Effect of travel in the Holy Land — Volney — Written histo- 
rical painting — Charles Lamb — Belshazzar's Feast — ^Washing- 
ton Allston — Poetical history of the Bible — The reputed philo- 
sophy of history — Lingard and Hume — Arnold — Tragic poetry 
— Sir Walter Scott — Funerals actual and picturesque — Ho- 
garth — Hume's accidental theory — Outline of Shakspeare's 
histories — Novelty of the subject of this lecture Page 13 



CONTENTS. 



LECTURE 11. 

THE LEGENDARY PERIOD OP BRITAIN: KING LEAR. 

Legendary period prior to the Roman invasion — Julius Caesar 
— Malone's comment — Fabulous antiquity of British kings — 
Brutus of Troy — Authentic ancient history limited to Southern 
Europe — Britain out of the path of the ancient world — Faber's 
idea of the Mediterranean — Milton's History of England — 
Faith in ancient legends — Claim of Edward the First to the 
sovereignty of Scotland — The Papal reference — Difference of 
British and classical legends — Grote on Greek legends — Min- 
strelsy and romance — Washington, in our sense, a legendary 
idea in America — Lives of the saints — Symbolical legends — 
Popular faith in legends — Identified with reverence for an- 
cestry — Sir Robert Walpole's false idea of history — Niebuhr — 
Modem colonies — King Lear a dramatic legend — Filial rela- 
tion — Illustrations appropriate to paganism — Lear's invocation 
of heathen gods — Charles Lamb's criticism on Lear Page 46 

LECTURE III. 

THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS : CYMBELINE AND MACBETH. 

Legendary history continued — Artegal and Elidure — The North- 
ern and Southern nations — Geographical divisions of Europe 
— Attempts of invasion frustrated — Rome sacked by the Gauls 
— Greece invaded and rescued — Defeat of Varus in the forest 
of Teutoburg — The memory of Arminius — Hermann — His un- 
finished monument — Decisive battles of the world — Professor 
Creasy's volumes — The fall of the Roman Empire — Effect of 
Roman subjugation of Britain — British kings — Cymbeline a 
British king — Imogen — Roman remains in Britain — Sir Walter 
Scott and Ritson — Diocletian's persecution — Arthur and Mer- 
lin — Ethelred — Paulinus — Alfred — Coleridge's estimate of his 
character — Difficulty of discussing historical questions — Po- 
lemics — Dunstan, an illustration — Sir Roger de Coverley — • 
Saint Dunstan — Want of a poetic view of his character — The 
Danes — Canute the Great — Ballads — Edward the Confessor — 
Touching for the "king's evil" — Reference in Macbeth — The 
palace and the tombs of English kings ...•• T8 



CONTENTS. 9 

LECTURE IV. 

THE REIGN OF KING JOHN. 

Interval between the last Saxon kings and King John — De- 
generacy of the Saxon race — Contagion of Danish vice — The 
Bristol slave-trade — The Northmen — The Normans — Their 
conquests — Death of Harold — Effect of the conquest on the 
conquerors — Their despotism — The Ptoyal Forest lands — The 
Curfew — Death of "William the Norman — Tyranny of his suc- 
cessors — Marriage of Henry the First to a Saxon princess — 
The Plantagenets — Richard Coeur-de-Lion — Romance of Ivan- 
hoe — Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury — King John, the first 
of the "Chronicle-Plays" — Imaginative power developed — 
John, a usurper — Shakspeare's view of his character — " Eng- 
land" the great idea of the play — Falconbridge its exponent 
— His character — Shakspeare's power "in minimis" — James 
Gurney's four words — France and Austria — Constance and 
Arthur — His death — Pandulph — Struggle with the Papacy — 
Innocent the Third — Stephen Langton — The interdict — Strug- 
gle with the barons — The Great Charter — Shakspeare's Eng- 
lish loyalty Page 115 

LECTURE V. 

THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE SECOND. 

Henry the Third and the Edwards passed over by Shakspeare 
— De Montfort's Rebellion — Growth of the Constitution — The 
Commons — Extent of parliamentary government — Our repub- 
lican institutions — The highway of nations — The Plantagenet 
kings — Edward the Third and the Black Prince — Chaucer — 
War with France — Arnold's view — Southcy — From Richard 
the Second the " Chronicle-Plays" continuous — The fifteenth 
century — King John and Henry the Eighth, prologue and 
epilogue — Richard the Second strictly historical — Character 
of the king — His previous career — Popular element in France 
and Flanders and England — Wat Tyler's Rebellion — Its effects 
— Revolt of the nobles — Opening of the tragedy — Norfolk and 
Bolingbroke — Exile — Character of Bolingbroke — Death of 
John of Gaunt — Moral degradation of the kin"- — His misfor- 



10 CONTENTS. 



tunes elevate him— Bolingbroke's return — Divine right of 
kings — Richard's deposition, imprisonment, and death Page 147 

LECTURE VI. 

THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FOURTH. 

Henry the Fourth's accession to the throne an usurpation — Cha- 
racter of the king — Error of historical reasoning — Carlyle on 
CromweU — Henry's education and exile — Analogy to Macbeth 
— His popularity — Counsel to his son — His visit to foreign 
lands — Palestine — Castile— His return — Severe policy after his 
coronation — The Bishop of Carlisle — Shakspeare's " Chronicle- 
Plays" tragic — Comic element here — Falstaff and Prince Hal 
— Henry the Fourth's reign without national interest — Unquiet 
times — Plan of his crusade — Its origin and his visit to the 
Holy Land — Intercession of the Greek emperor for English aid 
— ^Visit of Palaeologus to London — St. Bernard — Plan of cru- 
sade frustrated — Insurrection in Scotland — Percy and Douglas 
— Battle of Otterbourne — Mortimer — Glendower — Chevy Chase 
— Hotspur and Falstaff — The Battle of Shrewsbury— Death 
of Henry the Fourth 181 

LECTURE VIL 

THE CHARACTER AND REIGN OP HENRY THE FIFTH. 

Sorrowful but vigorous reign of the fourth Henry — His successor 
Shakspeare's favourite — His reign of conquest — His career as 
Prince of Wales — Not profligate but popular — A prince and a 
gentleman — His honour to Richard's memory — Veneration for 
his father — Relations of heirs-apparent — Statute against heresy 
— The Proto-martyr — Contrast of the prince and his brother, 
Prince John — Macbeth's want of children — Henry the Fifth a 
genial character — His associates of early life — The character 
of Falstaff considered — Morgann's essay — Friendship— Hamlet 
and Horatio — Henry and Falstaff — Falstaff's cowardice — Mr. 
Senior's criticism — Henry's accession to the throne — The war 
with France — Battle of Agincourt — Henry's relations to his 
soldiers — Sir Thomas Erpingham — Death of York and Suffolk 
--The tragedy a triumphal song 213 



CONTENTS. 11 



LECTURE VIII. 

THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 

The treaty of* Troyes — Its details — The last hours of Henry the 
Fifth — His intended crusade — Hume's comments — Henry the 
Sixth an infant — His reign and these " Chronicle-Plays" un- 
promising subjects — Genuineness of the plays — The Minority 
— The French wars — State of France — The Regent Bedford — 
The Siege of Orleans — Joan of Arc — Various criticisms on her 
character — Her sincerity — Imputed witchcraft — Defective edu- 
cation — Her influence — Relief of Orleans — Coronation of the 
king at Rheims — Exemption of Domremy — Capture of the 
Maid — Her trial and examination — Her martyrdom — Cardinal 
Beaufort and the Bishop of Beauvais — The cardinal's death — 
Statue of the Maid at Versailles — Death of the Duke of Bedford 
— His monument — Magnanimity of Louis the Elerenth.... Pa^re 245 



LECTURE IX. 

THE WARS OP THE ROSES. 

Closing scenes of the Plantagenet dynasty — ^Want of interest in 
the War of the Roses — The question of genealogy — No actua- 
ting principle in the contest — Its obscurity — A series of bloody 
battles — Saintly character of the king — His solitary sadness — 
Loss of the French conquests — The Duke of Suffolk — Popular 
tumult — Jack Cade — The Temple Garden — Richard of York 
and Somerset— The battle of St. Albans— The Earl of War- 
wick, the king-maker — Henry's captivity — The Parliament — 
Margaret of Anjou — Her character — King Rene — Injustice of 
English writers to her memory — The battle of Wakefield — 
Two crowned Kings of England — The slaughter at Towton — 
Tewksbury — The queen — Sir Walter Scott's tribute to her — 
Political effects of the civil war — Death struggle of the military 
power of the nobles — The last of the barons — Clifford — No feud 
among the people or vassals — The separation of the church 
from the conflict — Education — The foundation of Eton 278 



12 CONTENTS. 



LECTURE X. 



RICHARD THE THIRD — HENRY THE EIGHTH. 

The character of Edward the Fourth — His death — Richard^a 
usurpation — Its character of intrigue and violence — The 
princes in the Tower — Attempted vindications — Their inefficacy 
— Sir Thomas More — Richard's deformity, mental and physical 
— Effect of personal deformity — Commanding intellect of the 
king — Power of will — No sympathy — No repentance — Contrast 
of Macbeth — Richard's dream — The last of the Plantagenets — 
The Tudor kings — Henry the Eighth — The progress of society 
and government — Henry's reign nearly contemporary with 
Shakspeare — The play of Henry the Eighth history — Wolsey's 
character — Catharine of Arragon — "Wolsey's fall and death — 
The approaching Reformation — Henry's character the worst in 
history — His death — Conclusion Page 309 



LECTURES ON TRAGIC POETRY. 

LECTURE L 
King Lear 345 

LECTURE IL 
Macbeth 375 

LECTURE IIL 
Hamlet 406 

LECTURE IV. 
Othello 437 



LECTURES 



ON 



ENGLISH HISTORY, 



LECTURE I.— INTRODUCTORY.* 

#ir l|e ^ttjbg of fistorg. 

Shakspeare's Chronicle-Plays — Legendary history : King Lear — Ko- 
man and Saxon: Cymbeline and Macbeth — Nature of the subject 
generally — Imaginative history defined — Not historical romance — 
Power of Imagination in historical painting — Archbishop Whateley's 
analysis — Lord Bacon's idea of dramatic poetry — Milton's Vision 
of Greece, in Paradise Regained — Sense of reality — Famines as 
described in history and poetry — Genoa in 1799 — Ghent in the 
fourteenth century — Philip Van Artavelde — Archdeacon Hare — 
Remote and obscure legends — Reality too distinct — Images and 
memories of the dead — Effect of travel in the Holy Land — Volney 
— Written historical painting — Charles Lamb — Belshazzar's Feast 
— "Washington Allston — Poetical history of the Bible — The reputed 
philosophy of history — Lingard and Hume — Arnold — Tragic poetry 
— Sir Walter Scott — Funerals actual and picturesque — Hogarth — 
Hume's accidental theory — Outline of Shakspeare's histories — 
Novelty of the subject of this lecture. 

It is my purpose to explain to you the nature of the 
course which I have announced, and to present some con- 
siderations respecting the study of history. 

* Delivered in the College Hall of the University of Pennsylvania, 
December 8th, 1846. 

13 



14 LECTURE FIRST. 



The subject of these lectures is that portion of modern 
history which is illustrated by Shakspeare's historical 
drama. The earliest of the reigns thus illustrated is that 
of King John ; the latest is that of Henry the Eighth : 
and between these, are Richard the Second, Henry the 
Fourth, the Fifth, the Sixth, and Richard the Third. 
This is a series, it will be observed, which carries us 
back into the agitated turmoil of the Middle Ages, and 
leads us on to the later form of social and political life in 
that period of history, which, to distinguish it from the 
mediaeval, has been called the ^^ modern of the modem." 
In these ^^Chronicle-Plays," as they are styled, there is 
comprehended the story of three eventful centuries — the 
thirteenth, fourteenth, and fifteenth — ^broken, indeed, by 
some considerable intervals of time. I will endeavour in 
the lectures partially to notice those intervals; and I pro- 
pose to extend my subject into a more remote antiquity, 
by taking the tragedy of King Lear as illustrative of the 
legendary times, and CymbeHne and Macbeth, of the 
Roman and Saxon periods, respectively. 

The nature of this subject renders these lectures lite- 
rary as well as historical; and they must combine the 
study of those two high departments of human thought, 
— poetry and history. Now I desire to say, at the out- 
set, that I have sought this combination, not so much as 
a means of relieving the severity of historical study and 
making it more attractive, as because I have a deep con- 
viction, that Poetry has a precious power of its own 
for the preservation of historical truth; that it can so 
revivify the past — can put such life in it — as to make it 
imperishable. I have it greatly at heart to carry this 
deep conviction of mine into your minds, and hope to be 



ON THE STUDY OP HISTORY. 15 



able to stow, if not by argument in tbis lecture, at least 
by actual evidence in those that follow, bow a great poet 
may be, at the same time, a great bistorian. 

Before going further with tbe subject of my lecture, 
let me take two or tbree minutes to prevent some misap- 
prehensions, which might otherwise occur. While there 
may be a legitimate and valuable service of the faculty 
of imagination in the cause of history, there is certainly a 
great deal that is utterly spurious and deceptive, espe- 
cially in the shape of historical novels, among which the 
few excellent stand distinguished from a multitude that 
are worthless. I have no occasion to refer to them, and 
wish to be understood as treating my subject altogether 
apart from them. 

Again, when I state that the imagination may minister 
to the knowledge of history, I certainly do not mean to 
say, that the poetic or dramatic form is better than any 
other form of history, or, indeed, to make any kind of 
comparison between them. There is in each its own 
peculiar value; and so vast is the range of history, that 
it needs them all : it gives ample duty to every one who 
labours to save the memory of the past — whether it be he 
who zealously collects authentic documents, or pores over 
time-worn inscriptions, or gathers unwritten traditions — 
whether it be annalist, or chronicler, or biographer, or 
historian. I allude to these various functions, not in the 
way of comparison, but, on the contrary, to show that no 
disparagement of them is to be understood, when I assert 
the use of the imagination in the study of history. 

Let me premise one other remark — that in employ- 
ing the term ^^Imagination," I mean not such a faculty 
of the mind as gives birth to the common works of 



16 LECTURE FIRST. 



fiction, nor even such as is represented in the inade- 
quate analysis that is met with in the usual systems of 
metaphysics, but that creative power which, whether it 
bear the name of imagination or no, is an element of 
every great mind, without which there may be acute 
intellect, there may be fine talents, but there cannot be 
that which is known as genius. I mean that inventive 
wisdom, which brings the truth to life by the help of its 
own creative energy — ^the poetic element which is found, 
not only in the souls of mighty artists, whether their art 
be poetry, or painting, or sculpture, but also of great 
philosophers and historians. 

I now may proceed in my endeavour to show, that this 
imaginative power does render important service in the 
acquisition of historical knowledge. In the first place, I 
ask your attention to this fact — that, whenever the ima- 
gination of a great artist, be he poet or be he painter, 
has touched any historic character or event, forthwith it 
acquires a lifelike reality, which other portions of history, 
on which no such light has fallen, do not possess. Why 
is it that we have so vivid a conception of that scriptural 
occasion — St. Paul at Athens — ^but because, in one of the 
grandest of the cartoons, Raffaelle has given to Christen- 
dom a vision of the apostle in that sublime attitude — 

*•■■ As if the expanded soul diffused itself. 
And carried to all spirits, with the act, 
Its affluent inspiration."* 

* This illustration was, no doubt, suggested by a letter from Charles 
Lamb to Southey, 6th May, 1815. He says, referring to "Roderic," 
where these lines occur — "It struck me forcibly that the feeling of 
these lines might have been suggested to you by the cartoon of Paul 
at Athens." Final Memorials, vol. iv. p. 215. W. B. R. 



ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 17 



Again, wliy is it that tliat splendid legend of early Roman 
history — the story of Coriolanus — is so fresh and famUiar 
to us, except that Shakspeare has so impersonated the 
pride of that patrician soldier, as to make us feel that he 
was not a mere name on the page of history, but a human 
being with like passions as ourselves. I present to you 
this fact also as unquestionably true, that the portion of 
English history which. Shakspeare has treated is more 
familiarly known, not only popularly, but in well-educated 
minds, and especially with reference to the characters of 
famous personages, than any other part of it. Why is it, 
that the first great civil conflict — the baronial war, in the 
reign of Henry the Third, with De Montfort at its head, 
— he who, when he fell, earned " a hero's honour and a 
martyr's name" — why is it known so much less than that 
other civil feud, the fury of which was quenched by the 
blood spilt on Bosworth Field ?* "Why is this, except that 
the latter period is seen in the light that is shed upon it 
by the imagination of Shakspeare? How the dramatic 
poet has so wrought upon those times as to inspire a life 
into them, I will not now stop to inquire. It is the fact 
I wish you to consider. From this, I pass to an authority 
on which much stress may be laid, because it comes from 
a writer remarkable for his logical and rather unimagina- 
tive habit of mind. It is a no less severe logician than 
Archbishop Whateley, who thus reasons, to show how 
imagination is needed in the study of history : — 

" It has seldom or ever been noticed, how important, 
among the intellectual qualifications for the study of his- 



* Sir Francis Palgrave. 
2 



18 LECTURE FIRST. 



tory, is a vivid imagination — a faculty which, conse- 
quently, a skilful narrator must himself possess, and to 
which he must be able to furnish excitement in others. 
Some may perhaps be startled at this remark, who have 
been accustomed to consider Imagination as having no 
other office than to feign and falsify. Every faculty is 
liable to abuse and misdirection, and Imagination among 
the rest ; but it is a mistake, to suppose that it necessa- 
rily tends to pervert the truth of history, and to mislead 
the judgment. On the contrary, our view of any trans- 
action, especially one that is remote in time or place, will 
necessarily be imperfect, generally incorrect, unless it 
embrace something more than a bare outline of the oc- 
currences — unless we have before the mind a lively idea 
of the scenes in which the events took place, the habits 
of thought and of feeling of the actors, and all the cir- 
cumstances connected with the transaction — ^unless, in 
short, we can, in a considerable degree, transport our- 
selves out of our own age, and country, and persons, and 
imagine ourselves the agents or spectators. It is from a 
consideration of all these circumstances, that we are en- 
abled to form a right judgment as to the facts which his- 
tory records, and to derive instruction from it. What we 
imagine, may, indeed, be wholly imaginary , i.e. unreal; 
but it may be what actually does or did exist. To say 
that Imagination, if not regulated by sound judgment 
and sufficient knowledge, may chance to convey to us 
false impressions of past events, is only to say that man 
is fallible. But such false impressions are even much 
the more likely to take possession of those whose imagi- 
nation is feeble or uncultivated. They are apt to ima- 
gine the things, persons, times, countries, &c., which 



ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 19 



they read of, as much less different from what they see 
around them than is really the case."* 

This may serve to correct a common misapprehension 
respecting the functions of the Imagination, and to show 
that, when disciplined and cultivated, it serves the cause 
of truth. This, too, is to be thought of, that the neg- 
lect of its culture does not extinguish it ; for existing, as 
it does, though in very different degrees, in all minds, it 
will act in some way, perhaps feebly, and fitfully, and 
irregularly; and if it is not trained in the service of 
wisdom and truth, it certainly will be found in alliance 
with folly and falsehood. 

I pass to another authority, immeasurably higher, 
when I quote a single sentence from Lord Bacon, who 
has said, that ^'Dramatic poetry is like history made 
visible, and is an image of actions past, as if they were 
present. "f Now I stand upon this sentence as the text 
of my lectures, and on the authority of Bacon as sustain- 
ing the view I am anxious to present of the imaginative 
study of history. In truth, I need attempt no more than 
to evolve the wisdom that is wrapped in these few words 
of a great philosopher — one of the greatest the world has 
known. 

When Lord Bacon speaks of dramatic poetry being 
history made visible, he could not have been thinking of 
mere scenic representations. Theatric art, in his day, 
was too rude and contracted for him to see in it aught 
but what was too mean to show the images of actions 

* "VVhateley's Elements of Rhetoric, p. 176. 

f " Dramatica est veluti Historia spectabilis : nam constituit ima- 
ginem rerum tanquam presentium : Historia, autem, tanauam praeteri- 
tarum." De Auorm. Sc. lib. ii. ch. xiii. 



20 LECTURE FIRST. 



past, as if they were present; and, indeed, he speaks 
elsewhere of its low estate. He thought of no scenic 
representation — no mere bodily vision — no spectacle for 
the outward eye — ^but of that vision of the mind, that 
inward sight, which Imagination gives. The aspiring and 
far-reaching genius of Bacon felt that, while our sensuous 
nature is limited to the visible, the audible, the present, 
and the palpable, the spirituality of our being can com- 
prehend the remote and the unseen. The heroes of 
antiquity rise up again in lifelike reality, and distant 
regions of the earth are made apparent; and, indeed, it 
may happen that the actual vision of the eyes may be 
most fitly told in words that speak only of the visions of 
the mind. When Milton visited the south of Europe, 
it was in his thoughts, after wandering in Valdarno, 
and by the leafy brooks of Vallambrosa, and amid the 
ruins of Rome, to cross from Italy over into Grreece. 
But this cherished purpose was thwarted by tidings that 
came from his own afflicted country; and, deeming it the 
duty of England's sons to stand upon England's soil in 
her season of adversity, he speeded homeward. Greece 
was never seen by Milton — I mean by those bodily eyes, 
which afterward were quenched in blindness. But the 
spiritual power of his imagination, enriched as it was 
with classic lore, had borne him to the glorious pro- 
montory of Attica. He had seen the olive groves of 
Academe; he had heard the whispers of the waters of 
Ilissus — the industrious murmur of the bees ; 'he had felt 
the pure air that was wafted from the waves of the bright 
^gean Sea to mingle with the breath of the flowery Hy- 
mettus. The poet's splendid vision has been recorded; 
and when, a few years ago, a learned traveller visited 



ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 21 



Greece, he lingered upon Hymettus; and, gazing over 
the country around Athens, he said: — '^I cannot leave 
the spot — the scene now present to my eyes — without 
repeating the description given by one who was no eye- 
witness of it. To omit it would be injustice to Athens as 
well as to Milton;" — and that fine description in the 
fourth book of Paradise Regained, was aptly rehearsed 
amid the music of those natural sounds, which are yet 
heard upon the hills of Attica.* 

Another and higher exercise of the Imagination is 
when it is employed to give us a sense of reality in 
the knowledge of the actions and the sufferings that 
history records. The mind may learn the facts of his- 
tory, and the memory may, at need, recall them; and yet 
there may be, withal, a most inadequate conception of 
their truth and reality. How little sense, at best, is 
there of what the annals of the world tell of suffering 
humanity! We read or hear, for instance, of a battle, 
and the numbers of those who have fallen in it; and, 
after a cold calculation, we think it a large or small 
proportion; and it makes about as much impression on 
us as any other statistics might. No sympathy is touched 
by these aggregates. The intellect calmly comprehends 
the facts, but the imagination is not astir to give them 
reality in our minds. It is comparatively a recent event 
in history — the dreadful famine in which thousands of 
the Genoese perished — when, in 1799, the French army 

* Quoted in substance from " Greece, Pictorial, Descriptive, and 
Historical, by Christopher Wordsworth, DD., p. 31." Milton's words 
as he turned from this glorious promise were — " Turpe enim existi- 
mabam, dum mei cives de libertate dimicarent, me, animi causa, otioso 
peregrinari." W. B. R. 



22 Lr.CTURK FIFvi-T. 



under Massena was besieiied iii their city, and a British 

fleet kept such unrelenting guard in that magnificent 

bay, that naught reached the sufferers, save the waves 

that 

" Dash their white foam against the palace walls 
Of Genoa — the superb."* 

The inhabitants of that wealthy and luxurious city 
were reduced to all desperate extremities, and twenty 
thousand innocent persons — women, too, and children — 
perished by the slow misery of famine. History tells us 
of these things in its didactic form : it gives us the 
information, but it gives us no more. In the fourteenth 
century, the like calamity, with pestilence superadded 
to famine, desolated one of the opulent and populous 
Flemish towns, and it is thus described in the Chronicles 
of Froissart : — 

"This whole winter of 1382, the Earl of Flanders had 
so much constrained Ghent, that nothing could enter the 
place by land or water : he had persuaded the, Duke of 
Brabant and Duke Albert to shut up their countries so 
effectually, that no provisions could be exported thence, 
but secretly, and with a great risk to those who attempted 
it. It was thought by the most intelligent, that it could 
not be long before they perished through famine, — for all 
the storehouses of corn were empty, and the people could 
not obtain bread for money. When the bakers had baked 
any, it was necessary to guard their shops; for the popu- 
lace) who were starving, would have broken them open. 
It was melancholy to hear these poor people (for men, 
women, and children of good substance were in this 

* Wordsworth's Musings near Aquapendente. Works, p. 319. 



ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 23 



miserable pligbt) make their daily complaints and cries 
to Philip Van Artavelde, their commander-in-chief." 

So is the suffering city described in the simple style of 
the old chronicler, and with, indeed, rather more of ani- 
mated narrative than history generally gives. 

I now refer to the fine historical drama by a living 
poet, — the Philip Van Artavelde of Henry Taylor, — to 
show how the image of the past is there presented. We 
gain the vision, when we read the words with which Van 
Artavelde addresses his companions as they see the city 
of Grhent lying in its wretchedness beneath them : — 

" Look round about on this once populous town ! 
Not one of these innumerous house-tops 
But hides some spectral form of misery, 
Some peevish, pining child, and moaning mother, 
Some aged man, that in his dotage scolds, 
Not knowing why he hungers, — some cold corse, 
That lies unstraightened where the spirit left it." 

A still deeper sense of reality is given by the imagina- 
tion being carried into the interior of one of those afflicted 
dwellings. Van Artavelde, meeting his sister, after her 
return from the awful charity of a starving and pestilen- 
tial city, questions her — 

"Now render me account of what befel — 
Where thou hast been to-day. 

Clara. It is but little. 
I paid a visit first to Ukenheim, 
The man, who whilome saved our father's life. 
When certain Clementists and ribald folk 
Assailed him at Malines. He came last night. 
And said he knew not if we owed him aught, 
But if we did, a peck of oatmeal now 
Would pay the debt, and save more lives than one. 



24 LECTURE i'lRST. 



I went. It seemed a wealthy man's abode ; 

The costly drapery and good house-gear 

Had, in an ordinary time, betokened 

That with the occupant the world went well. 

By a low couch, curtained with cloth of frieze, 

Sat Ukenheim, a famine-stricken man, 

With either bony fist upon his knees. 

And his long back upright. His eyes were fixed 

And moved not, though some gentle words I spake ; 

Until a little urchin of a child, 

That called him father, crept to where he sat. 

And plucked him by the sleeve, and with its small 

And skinny finger pointed: then he rose, 

And with a low obeisance, and a smile 

That looked like watery moonlight on his face, 

go pale and weak a smile, he bade me welcome. 

I told him that a lading of wheat-flour 

Was on its way, whereat, to my surprise, 

His countenance fell, and he had almost wept. 

Art. Poor soul ! and wherefore ? 

Clara. That I soon perceived. 
He plucked aside the curtain of the couch, 
And there two children's bodies lay composed. 
They seemed like twins of some ten years of age. 
And they had died so nearly both together 
He scarce could say which first : and being dead. 
He put them, for some fanciful afiection. 
Each with its arm about the other's neck. 
So that a fairer sight I had not seen 
Than those two children, with their little faces 
So thin and wan, so calm, and sad, and sweet. 
I looked upon them long, and for a while 
I wished myself their sister, and to lie 
With them in death, as they did with each other; 
I thought that there was nothing in the world 
I could have loved so much ; and then I wept; 
And when he saw I wept, his own tears fell. 
And he was sorely shaken and convulsed. 
Through weakness of his frame and his great grief. 



ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 26 



Art. Mucli pity was it lie so long deferred 
To come to us for aid. 

Clara. It was, indeed. 
But whatsoe'er had been his former pride, 
He seemed a humhled and heart-broken man. 
He thanked me much for what I said was sent; 
But I knew well his thanks were for my tears. 
He looked again upon the children's couch. 
And said, low down, they wanted nothing now. 
So, to turn oflF his eyes, 
I drew the small survivor of the three 
Before him ; and he snatched it up, and soon 
Seemed quite forgetful and absorbed. With that 
I stole away." 

Now this is purely imaginary ; and yet, how perfectly 
expressive is it of the truth ! How much more truthful 
is it than mere lifeless narrative-accuracy; and how 
deeply into our hearts does it carry the sense of the 
reality ! Consider how little was known a few years ago 
of this same Philip Yan Artavelde, until, within our own 
day, the vision of a living English poet's imagination is 
turned to the comparatively obscure region of the annals 
of Flanders, and forthwith Van Artavelde becomes, what 
even Froissart had not succeeded in making him^ a fami- 
liar historical personage. 

In continuing this analysis of the employment of the 
Imagination in the study of history, there are still highei 
and more precious functions, than this power of present- 
ing picture-like impressions, which I have been endea- 
vouring to illustrate. 

We are all of us, I dare say, apt to think of the com- 
position and the study of history as a much simpler and 
easier thing than it really is. But if history were no 
more than a mere chronicle of facts, — a mere record of 



26 LECTURE FIRST. 



men, their deeds, and their dates, — reflect how soon 
there gather over these uncertainty, obscurity, and 
blank oblivion. It may be that the historian is toiling 
to recover the knowledge of some far remote age — that 
he strives to decipher the timeworn inscriptions of a lost 
language, or the mystery of hieroglyphics, or that he 
questions the awful silence of the Pyramids, which, 
almost as long, it might seem, as the earth has endured, 
have been pointing to the sun, or bearing on their huge 
bulk the darkness of the night. Or it may be that the 
historian's labour is not upon the scant materials of a 
dim antiquity, but upon the immense accumulation from 
which the history of a later time is to be extracted. 
Now, in either case, it is scarcely possible to estimate 
justly, much less to exaggerate, the magnitude of such 
labour, or the might of human genius, that is needed to 
achieve even an approach to it. This has been eloquently 
set forth by a thoughtful living author, in a sentence 
which reminds me of the magnificent structure of the 
prose of Milton or Jeremy Taylor: — "The field of opera- 
tion is so vast and unsurveyable, so much lies wrapped 
up in thick, impenetrable darkness, while other portions 
are obscured by the mists which the passions of men 
have spread over them, and a spot, here and there, shines 
out dazzlingly, throwing the adjacent parts into the 
shade; the events are so inextricably intertwisted and 
conglomerated, sometimes thrown together in a heap, — 
often rushing onward and spreading out like the Khine, 
until they lose themselves in a morass, — and now and 
then, after having disappeared, rising up again, as was 
fabled of the Alpheus, in a distant region, which they 
reach through an unseen channel ; the peaks, which first 



ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 27 



meet our eyes, are mostly so barren, while the fertilizing 
waters flow secretly through the valleys ; the statements 
of events are so perpetually at variance, and not seldom 
contradictory; the actors on the ever-shifting stage are so 
numerous and promiscuous; so many undistinguishable 
passions, so many tangled opinions, so many mazy preju- 
dices are ever at work, rolling and tossing to and fro in a 
sleepless conflict, in which every man's hand and heart 
seem to be against his neighbour, and often against him- 
self; it is so impossible to discern and separate the effects 
brought about by man's will and energy, from those which 
are the result of outward causes, of circumstances, of con- 
junctures, of all the mysterious agencies summed up 
under the name of chance ; and it requires so much faith, 
as well as wisdom, to trace any thing like a pervading 
overruling law through the chaos of human affairs, and to 
perceive how the banner which God has set up, is still 
borne pauselessly onward, even while the multitudinous 
host seems to be struggling waywardly, busied in petty 
bickerings and personal squabbles ; — that a perfect, con- 
summate history of the world may not unreasonably be 
deemed the loftiest achievement that the mind of man 
can contemplate."* It is from the entangled and enor- 
mous mass, thus described, of memorials, and traditions, 
and records, that history is to be evolved. For the work, 
there is not a faculty of the human mind that is not 
needed, besides the great moral qualification — a love of 
truth, that shall be at once calm in its action, and pas- 
sionate in its earnestness and its impatient hatred of 
falsehood. What concerns my present subject chiefly is, 

*■ Hare's Guesses at Truth. First Series, p. 353. 



LECTURE FIRST. 



that historic truth is gained, not only by the logical pro- 
cesses of the intellect, hut by that inventive power which 
can discover the truth when argument alone could not 
have disclosed it ; and it has been wisely said, that the 
union of the poet and the philosopher is essential to form 
the perfect historian. It is not, I think, possible to find, 
in the records of all literature, one great historian in the 
constitution of whose mind the imaginative faculty is not 
a large element — the ability, not simply to reason about 
historic testimony, but also to behold the past — to see it 
with the mind's eye; and this is essentially the same 
thing as poetic vision, by which the dead, the distant, are 
made living and present. It is only when this philoso- 
phic and poetic power combined looks upon the multitu- 
dinous facts of past times, that these facts are duly 
arrayed and harmonized into just order and proportion. 
Amid the actual occurrences, how much is there that is 
unmeaning and worthless — nay, worse than worthless, 
because often obtrusive, and standing between our minds 
and that which is significant and valuable. All such 
obstructions the genuine historian sweeps away in silence ; 
and knowledge is acquired, not only by what is told, but 
by what is left untold. Men, and the deeds of men, are 
to be exhibited in the just subordination to the control- 
ling agencies of their times. The simple chronicler may 
be content to make his record of events with no discrimi- 
nation; but history is more than a chronological table, 
and the historian must idealize the actual ; he must give 
it such a form, that we may see the causes of events, and 
the living, actuating principles that were at work in 
them. Now, when the philosophic or the imaginative 
eye of the historian — (I care not which it be called, for I 



ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 



believe all true pMlosopliy is imaginative^ and all genuine 
imagination is pMlosopliical) — wlien tlie eye of tlie histo- 
rian contemplates a period of history, after deep study, 
he sees all that is important, and influential, and perma- 
nent, and he sees it in all its essential character and 
reality, while a thousand insignificant circumstances have 
faded out of his thoughts. Thus it is that the actual is 
idealized into the highest and purest truth. 

Reflect how often our sense of truth is impaired or 
impeded by the pressure on our minds of what is actual, 
and visible, and present. A faithful painter may, in the 
highest style of his art, portray a human face with all its 
characteristic expression and in all its true individuality; 
and yet the nearest relatives are not only the hardest to 
satisfy, but, by the very nature of their familiarity with 
the subject, will often be the worst judges of the likeness. 
Again, I believe we are all of us veiy apt to fail in 
appreciating the best and the noblest parts in the charac- 
ters of those whom we know familiarly, for the thousand 
familiarities of common life interpose; and it is sad to 
think, that often it is not until Death hath hallowed and 
idealized the character, that we can do it justice. Then 
the eye can no longer see the familiar face, the ear no 
longer catch sounds of the familiar voice ; but the soul, 
apart from the senses, is left to the solemn, solitary work, 
and beholds the strength and the purity of the spirit that 
has passed away, more truly than when it was incarnate 
in this life. 

I use these illustrations to show how much that which 
is matter of fact, as it is called, often stands in the way 
of truth; and I cannot doubt, that one of the great moral 
purposes for which the Imagination has been implanted 



LECTURE FIRST. 



in us is, tliat it may enable us to triumph over the 
bondage of the senses, of wbicb it may be said, as of 
the elements of fire and water, that they are good ser- 
vants, but very bad masters. The soul must keep do- 
minion over them, or else we are sure to be beset by the 
manifold mischiefs and miseries of materialism in some or 
other of its forms. The most elevated sense of truth in 
the spirit of a man may be grievously and disastrously 
disturbed by the presence of that which affects only the 
senses. It is said that Yolney was made an infidel by 
his travels in Palestine; and though it is fearful to think 
of faith dying out of a Christian's soul in consequence of 
his eyes having before them the visible presence of the 
Holy Land, yet there is a natural process by which such 
a defection is conceivable. 

When, at a distance, we think of Mount Sinai, or of 
the Mount of Olives, or of that other more awful emi- 
nence, they are more spiritual than material places of 
the earth. The ^^ Delectable Mountains'^ in the Pilgrim's 
Progress are, to my mind, scarce more visionary; and 
with such feelings, the events that give a sanctity to 
those spots, are in perfect harmony. But when the 
traveller actually stands upon that ground, — ^when it is 
visible and tangible, — and when, feeling the very soil, 
the vegetation, and the stones, beneath his feet, he calls 
to mind Jehovah's presence on that selfsame place, or the 
Saviour's incarnate life, then the impression of the senses 
and the spiritual associations may come in conflict. In the 
heart of Yolney it proved an irreconcilable conflict, and 
faith yielded to what was sensuous. It may well be 
believed, that any one who visits that land, not in the 
reverential spirit of the early Christian pilgrim, but with 



ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 31 



the thouglitless sight-seeing temper of the modern travel- 
ler, has need to pray that his faith be strengthened before 
his eyes rest on places, which, before, had only been ap- 
prehended by his imagination. 

In the composition of history, and eminently in the 
historical drama, there must needs be this poetic process, 
by which the actual is subordinated to the ideal, that 
which is inconsiderable put out of sight, and such unity 
given to the subject as will best display its real truth. 
It is one of the chief functions of the Imagination to give 
unity and harmony to the materials of which it treats ; 
and, perhaps, I may explain this more clearly by refer- 
ence to an act kindred to historical poetry, — I mean, his- 
torical painting. In one of the most admirable of the 
Elia Essays, so full of a fine and humorous philosophy, 
Charles Lamb has observed that '^ not all that is optically 
possible to be seen is to be shown in every picture. By a 
wise falsification, the great masters of painting got at their 
true conclusions, by not showing the actual appearances 
that is, all that was to be seen at any given moment by 
an indifi"erent eye, but only what the eye might be sup- 
posed to see in the doing or sufi"ering of some portentous 
action.'^* In this same essay, he shows, by a careful 
comparison, that it is in their barrenness of the imagina- 
tive faculty, that most modern works of art are so inferior 
to the paintings by the great masters, which, on this 
very account, were so much more impressive and truth- 
ful. He exemplifies this deficiency in Martin's histori- 
cal paintings, which are familiar to us all by the help 



* Essay on the Barrenness of the Imaginative Faculty in the Pre 
ductions of Modern Art. Lamb's Prose Works, vol. iii. p. 176. 



32 LECTURE FIRST. 



of the engravings; and in the Belshazzar's Feast of that 
artist, after noticing the alarm which has thrown the 
well-dressed lords and ladies in the Hall of Belus into 
such admired confusion, he justly asks, — "Is this an 
adequate ' exponent of supernatural terror ? The way in 
which the finger of Grod writing judgments would have 
been met by a guilty conscience? There is a human 
fear, and a divine fear. The one is disturbed, restless, 
and bent upon escape. The other is bowed down, effort 
less, and passive."* This same scriptural subject has 
been treated by another modern artist — one whose genius 
was full of that imaginative power, which was the glory 
of the old masters — I mean our countryman, the late 
Washington Allston ; and I wish that you had seen that 
great, but unfinished painting, were it only that I might 
now the better appeal to it as an illustration, to show how 
the imagination can worthily and triumphantly reproduce 
the events of history. On beholding it, one is made to 
feel that the supernatural writing was a transaction, so to 
speak, between Grod and that impious king — the prophet 
participating in divine power, while he is inspired to 
interpret the mysterious words. You see that it is upon 
Eelshazzar that the awful terror has fallen with all its 
weight — that it is he — still gorgeous with barbaric pearl 
and gold, and just now so proud in his profanity — that it 
is he, and, perhaps, he alone that has beheld the fingers 
of a hand come forth and write upon the palace walls ; 
and that it is his spirit which is withered by the pro- 
phet's interpretation — "Grod hath numbered thy king- 
dom and finished it. Thou art weighed in the balances 

* Lamb's Prose "Works, vol. iii. p. 173. 



ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 



and art found wanting. Thy kingdom is divided, and 
given to the Modes and Persians." In the foreground 
of the picture are seen the queen, heart-stricken with 
terror, and awe, and grief — the group of the baffled 
soothsayers and astrologers — the captive Israelites reve- 
rentially bowing around their inspired countryman. In 
the middle distance are the tables of the impious feast, 
with Belshazzar's thousand lords — his wives and concu- 
bines ; and afar off, methought I saw thousands of Baby- 
lonians thronging to the huge idol th^t towered in the 
distance — and yet all so controlled by the genius of a 
great historical painter, that there is ever present to your 
mind the leading truth of the history, — that it is Bel- 
shazzar's soul that Grod is dealing with, and that it is 
over his appalled spirit that is hanging the fulfilment 
which closes the story of him and his empire. ^'In that 
night was Belshazzar slain, and Darius the Mode took 
the kingdom." The creative power of a great artist, a 
poet-painter, has made" that historical occasion visible. 
I am sure that I am thus made to feel the truth and the 
reality of that chapter of sacred history more deeply than 
I ever felt it before, and that I shall never think of it 
otherwise than as Allston has shown it to me.* So is it 

* In the summer of 1842, my brother accompanied me on a 
visit to New England, and there he became personally acquainted 
with Mr. Allston. He saw " Belshazzar" afterward. In an address 
delivered before the Art Union of Philadelphia, he thus refers to this 
visit : — 

"When Death suddenly, but with its gentlest stroke, closed the 
career of the most eminent painter our country has produced, — ] 
mean the late Washington Allston, — the paint was left wet on that 
great scriptural painting, unhappily incomplete, to which he had 
devoted many of the best, and all the later, years of his life, — a life 

3 



34 LECTURK FIllST. 



that the imagination of the genuine painter addresses 
itself to the imagination of the spectator ; and, as history- 
is wrought on by the genius of the artist, so it is by that 
of the historical poet : so, indeed, too, — in a somewhat 
different way, — ^by every great historian. All history of 
a high order must be animated by the vivifying spirit 
of the Imagination; and I give the highest possible 
authority for this opinion, when I remind you that 
inspired history abounds with it. That one chapter, for 
instance, which describes the event of which I have just 
been speaking, the downfall of the Babylonian Empire, 
is instinct with Imagination from the first verse to the 
last. 

Having chanced to touch upon this train of thought, 
let me follow it a step further, for the sake of the 
authority. So large a space in the record of revelation 
is occupied by history and poetry, that one cannot help 
recognising and revering them as the appointed modes 



and a name which I cannot mention without regretting that I must 
not stop to say what might be said of them, as showing the beauty 
and the dignity, the truth and the moral power, that dwell in the soul 
of a great Christian artist. With his high powers as a painter, there 
was united a most exquisite spirit of criticism, wherein it would have 
been -hard to say which was the largest element, — a fine philosophy 
or tender Christian sympathy. I remember with what deep but 
tranquil emotion, in tones that were the very music of modesty and 
genius, he lamented, rather than rebuked, that injurious temper 
of criticism which seizes on the weak points of a painter's work, and 
shuts its vision to all that is genuine and great. He made the 
remark with reference to Haydon ; and I could not but recall it, when, 
not a great while afterward, we heard the tragic story of that painter's 
death, — how, in the metropolis of Great Britain, he was driven by 
neglect and that wrong, which Allston had reproved, to a crazed brain 
and an awful suicide." W. B. R. 



ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 



of divine instruction — as chosen instruments for the 
guidance of the human soul. You find there history, 
in its severe form of the Chronicles ; you find poetry in 
its most sublime form; and, what is more applicable to 
my present subject, you find history and poetry combined 
in those marvellous proportions unattainable by the unin- 
spired imagination of man. And what a dull, dreary, 
dismal Bible it would be, if all that was imaginative in it 
were quenched ! If inspiration come direct — direct, I 
mean, from the throne of God — into the mind of man, it 
has utterance, for the most part, in some imaginative 
form — it may be a lyric chaunt, like that which burst 
from the lips of Moses and Miriam over the Egyptian 
warriors, Busiris and his Memphian chivalry, — '^ the 
horse and his rider cast into the sea;'^ and if the inspira- 
tion is given to tell, not of the past, but of the future, it 
finds voice in the lofty strains of prophetic poetry. And 
so when inspiration comes into the mind ; as the consti- 
tutional endowment of poetic genius, it, too, seeks expres- 
sion in some imaginative form, whether its plastic power 
be employed on the canvas, or on marble, or in words. 

In the next place, a great impediment in the way of 
historical knowledge, as, indeed, of all knowledge, is that 
he who writes, and he who reads, history, is apt to bring 
with him prejudices and prepossessions; and accordingly, 
the study is carried on, not with the love of truth as 
the prime and master impulse, but to make out some 
theory, or to sanction some preconceived bias. The con- 
sequence of this is, that there are few histories to which 
the reader can intrust himself with believing, confiding 
docility; instead of which, he has to be perpetually on 
his guard, as if he were walking with a foe instead of a 



36 LECTUIIE FIRST. 

friend ; and he is forced to seek truth by that painful, 
miserable process of balancing one extreme against an- 
other. Of all the histories of England, there is not one, 
I am safe in saying, which is not, in one way or other, 
a partisan history; and the historians who make the 
proudest boast of their philosophy and their liberality, 
are not seldom the most narrow-minded and treacherous; 
so that it has been well said that, what has been called 
^'ihe philosophy of history, may be denominated the 
philosophy of romance ; for by few writers has so much 
been done to pervert the truth of history, as by the so 
called ^philosophical historians/ "^ 

I have said there is not an impartial history of Eng- 
land, inasmuch as every writer of it has looked on his 
subject, not in the clear atmosphere of candour and of 
truth, but through the disturbing medium of some party 
opinions and feelings. Each historian has some point of 
vision to which he is bound by his prejudices; and only 
from that can he look back on past ages. Worse than 
all, the most familiar history of England, the classic 
history, — I mean Mr. Hume's, — is the product of a mind, 
that could look upon other times only through those 
deadly vapours that are perpetually rising from an infi- 
del's heart. From the low and unhealthy region of a 
shallow, deistical philosophy, he never rose to the lofty 
stations of truth; and how could a dry, hard, sophistical, 

* This remark will be found in the advertisement to the fourth 
volume of the quarto, and, I believe, first, edition of Lingard's History 
of England, p. vi. In the last edition, revised shortly before the 
author's death, he says : — " Nor do I hesitate to proclaim my belief 
that no writers have proved more successful in the perversion of his- 
toric truth than speculative and philosophical historians." W. B. R. 



ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 3T 



and unimaginative intellect^ like his, have any feeling in 
common with the heroism and the piety of other ages ? 
With an impassable gulf between his spirit and the spirit 
of those times, how could he be a faithful or a just 
historian of them ? 

Now, to bring these considerations to bear on my 
subject, when an historian, whether in prose or poetry, 
comes to his arduous wotk, a strong and well-disciplined 
imagination lifts him up from the atmosphere of preju- 
dice and error into a pure region of truth. It is the 
precious moral agency of the Imagination to raise us out 
of a narrow-minded selfishness; it enables us to think 
and to feel with others, and thus to judge of them with 
candour and with charity, and therefore with truth. It 
puts it in the historian's power to look upon distant ages 
in the spirit of those ages, and thus to give a genuine 
knowledge of them. Instead of this, history is made 
controversial ; it is tortured into the sanction or the sub- 
version of some system ; and it is seen only in such a 
light, or is placed only in such a light, that all the events 
of past ages shall seem to do homage to some narrow- 
minded and exclusive speculation of the historian. Po- 
litical writers, for instance, treat the civil institutions, 
even of antiquity, in such a way, that the narrative shall 
make, respectively, in favour or against modern theories 
of liberalism or absolutism. The Protestant and the 
Roman Catholic historian will so shape their stories 
of the early and middle ages of the Church and of 
Europe, as to support or condemn the great movement 
of the Reformation ; and thus, while writing the history 
of one century, they will, in reality, be thinking much 
more of another and a later one. Or an historian, 



38 LECTURE FIRST. 



like Hume, writing in tlie deistical temper of his own 
day, labours to make all liistory servile to tlie shallow 
skepticism of the eighteenth century; and though unable 
to conceal, that Christianity, or rather let me say more 
precisely, the Church of Christ, is the great distinguish- 
ing element of modern history, Hume never spares the 
pains to tempt the unwary reader to think, with him, 
that all religious feeling is either fraud or superstition, 
and that Christian earnestness is no more than a mockery 
or a delusion. But the dutiful culture of the Imagina- 
tion, together with that of the practical understanding, 
Baves us from many errors that else are apt to beset us in 
our narrow-mindedness. The historian, as he goes forth 
into the past ages of the world, needs all the comprehen- 
sive spirit which the philosophic imagination gives, — ^the 
ample feeling with which a true poet, on beholding, in 
another region of Christendom, religious rites different 
from the familiar ones of his own land, exclaims — 

''Where'er we roam — along the brink 
Of Rhine, or by the sweeping Po, 
Through Alpine vale or champaign wide, 
Whate'er we look on — at our side 
Be Charity, to bid us think 
And feel if we would know."* 

This spirit of capacious charity, which is one of the 
\-haracteristics of the imaginative mind, brings with it 
tiiis great gain, that it leads the historian to do justice to 
ttie better side of human nature as it is displayed in 
history. He will habitually seek out all that is good 

* TTcrd-B worth's Lines composed in one of the Catholic Cantocs. 
Works, p. 280. 



ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 



and great in the annals of the world, and thus will feed 
the genial sense of admiration on which the health of our 
moral nature so much depends. It is with admirable 
feeling that Arnold says, — "If an historian be an unbe- 
liever in all heroism — if he be a man who brings every 
thing down to the level of a common mediocrity, depend 
upon it the truth is not found in such a writer.' '* The 
best truth of history, let me add, is lost to that censo- 
rious, sneering, sarcastic temper, which is its own curse ; 
for it can see only what is selfish, and mean, and vicious. 
There will, indeed, be found enough of evil passion and 
guilt upon the pages of history; but when sentence is 
pronounced, let it be with the tone of solemn judgment, 
and not of satire. f Clinging to the truth in all that is 
pure and elevated in our struggling human nature, we 
may do well to cherish the memory of the heroic deeds, 
the virtues, the self-devotion, and whatever else has given 



* Lectures on Modern History, p. 301. 

f I shall have occasion, at one part of this course, in connection 
with the career of Henry the Fifth, to see the tone of history alle- 
viated hy the inimitable comic element of the character of Falstaflf; 
but, for the most part, we find that the historical drama carries 
us into the region of lofty passions — that its largest element is that 
of tragedy — that it is by suflTering that the characters of men and 
nations are formed and disciplined— that it is in the school of adver- 
sity that high virtues are engendered; for, 

"Oh, Life ! without thy chequered scene 
Of right and wrong, of weal and wo. 
Success and failure, could a ground 
For magnanimity be found ; 
For faith, 'mid ruined hopes, serene ? 
Or whence could virtue flow ?" 

Wordsworth, p. 280. H. R. 



40 LECTURE FIRST. 



glory and dignity to the generations of mankind. This 
is the most permanent and the most precious portion 
of history, and it is that to which a well-cultivated 
imagination, and, indeed, the simplest good sense and 
good feeling, will turn instinctively. Remember how 
much it is a matter of choice and of habit with us, 
whether we will look upon things with a good or an 
evil eye } and remember, too, that the seat of the scoffer 
is not the seat of wisdom — that truth is vouchsafed to 
him who seeks it with a generous sympathy and a docile 
temper, and that it is denied to him who comes with sus- 
picion, and pride, and a spirit of contempt. 

Let me give a single illustration, to show how the self- 
same occasion may be presented under very different 
aspects, in one of which there may be present that which 
disturbs and distracts our impressions of the truth, while 
in the other the imaginative view may be much more 
faithful to them. In a passage in his private diary, Sir 
Walter Scott has expressed an aversion to funerals, 
because so much of what is seen and heard at them 
is painfully discordant with the genuine grief, the depth 
of which can neither be seen nor heard. " I hate fune- 
rals,^^ he writes; ^Hhere is such a mixture of mummery 
with real grief — the actual mourner, perhaps, heart- 
broken, and all the rest making solemn faces, and 
whispering observations on the weather or public news, 
and here and there a greedy fellow enjoying the cake 
and wine. But," he adds, ^^the funeral at a dis- 
tance, — the few mourners on horseback, with their 
plaids wrapped around them,- — the father heading the 
procession as they enter the river, and pointing out 
the ford by which his darling is to be carried — none 



ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 41 



of tlie subordinate figures in discord with the general 
tone of the incident, hut seeming just accessories and no 
more — the distant funeral is afi'ecting.'^* The first of 
these scenes Scott saw with the keen, observing eye, with 
which he studied human nature in its weakness as well 
as its strength : the Other he beheld with a poet^s eye ; 
and he gazed on it as it was idealized by the distance 
and by his own imagination. I ask you which of these 
views is the true one ? It may be answered that each 
has a truth of its own. Well, then, which more truly 
expresses the real feeling of the occasion ? If the pur- 
pose be to show the utter heartlessness of mourning, then 
Hogarth's picture of a funeral, at once comic and hideous, 
will best answer the purpose; but then, at best, it is 
only satire, and we feel the truth of that view which is 
harmonized by the imagination, "j" 

* Lockh art's Scott, vol. viii. p. 322. 

t Hogarth's Pictures, or rather the folio volume of engravings, was 
one of the picture-books of my boyhood j and now I am not ashamed 
to record the heresy, that no creation of art is in every way more 
repulsive to me. The furx is, to my eye, hideous. They may be 
historical pictures, (so Hazlitt dignifies them,) but they are historical 
of the most unpicturesque period of modern times — the first quarter or 
half of the eighteenth century — the early Georgian era. If Hogarth 
had illustrated such a ghastly book as Lord Hervey's Memoirs, what 
happy congeniality of art and letter-press it would have been ! — and 
what man or woman of delicacy would care to open the volume ! 

W. B. R. 

A friend, to whom I have shown this note, calls my attention to a 
passage from Goethe, on the same subject : 

"The third work formed for itself quite another circle of readers. 
The interest devoted to Lichtcnbery's Hogarth was, in reality, a facti- 
tious interest: for how could the German feel any real enjoyment oi 
whims and oddities that rarely occurred in the circumstances of the 



42 LECTURE FIRST. 



The poetic, faculty enables tlie liistoriau or tlie histori- 
cal poet to accomplisli another important result in our 
knowledge of historical occurrences and characters. In 
the preface to the tragedy of ^^ Richelieu/' Bulwer speaks 
of the historic drama as ''the concentration of historic 
events ;" and Coleridge has described it as " a collection 
of events borrowed from history^ but connected together, 
in respect of cause and time, poetically and by dramatic 
fiction; and thus, while the unity from mere succession 
may be destroyed, it is supplied by a unity of a higher 
order, which connects the events by reference to the 
workers, gives a reason for them in the motives, and 
presents men in their causative character/'* Now, this 
''unity of a higher order" which Coleridge speaks of, 
brings to view that moral meaning, which, while it is the 
chief value of 'history, is so difficult to discover in the 
multitude and perplexity of historical events. Facts, 
which seem to stand wholly apart, are shown to have 
some moral association : a blessing, which actually fol- 
lowed, perhaps, afar off and obscurely, is brought near to 
the happy influence which produced it, and retribution 
comes manifestly to guilt, which brings suffering not only 
to itself, but to the innocent, according to the dark 

simple avd pure life of his own countrymen ? It was only the tradi- 
tion, "which made current upon the Continent a name glorified by the 
English — it was only the singularity of being able to possess all of 
these whimsical representations complete in one body, and the conve- 
nient circumstance that there was no need of bringing to the study 
and admiration of these works any knowledge or feeling of art, but 
only a bad disposition and contempt for mankind — that favoured, in a 
very peculiar way, this remarkable success." Goethe's Works, (1840,) 
vol. xxvii. p. 511. (Annalen, oder Tag-und Jahres-Hefte.) 
* Literary Remains. Works, vol. viii. p. 29. 



ON THE STUDY OF HISTORY. 



mystery of tliat law, by whicli misery is carried down to 
the third and fourth generations. 

T\Tien Hume, in his history, reaches the end of a 
splendid era of English history, he closes it with this 
reflection — that "the study of the early institutions 
of the country is instructive, as showing that a mighty 
fabric of government is built up by a great deal of acci- 
dent, with a very little human foresight and wisdom/' 
In our meek hours of faith, we are taught that not a 
sparrow falls to the ground without Glod's providence; 
and then we turn to the infidel history to learn there 
how the "kingly commonwealth' ' of England, that has 
swayed the happiness of millions of human beings, and 
has sent forth this vast Republic of the West, grew up 
by accident; that, with all its influence on the human 
race, it was but the creature of chance. It is thus that 
history becomes atheism, from which we may gladly turn 
to the better philosophy of the poet-historian.* In 

* My brother had a strong aversion (if such a word is admissible in 
matters of criticism) to Hume and his History; and, as is clear from 
many passages of these lectures, was at no pains to conceal it. He 
had no sympathy with the tolerance of error which praises Hume, 
adopts or recommends his history as a text-book, and contents itself 
with incidental corrections of errors and misrepresentations. (Smyth's 
Lectures, vol. i. lect. v.) He would as soon have taught from Paine 
as from Hume; for he believed that Hume's principles, enforced 
more perniciously in his History than anywhere else, were, as Lord 
Brougham admits them to be, "atheism, not skepticism." (Men of 
Letters, p. 177. Art. on Hume.) To Hume's skill as a rhetorician, 
he, perhaps, did injustice — though, with my brother, I incline to the 
belief that time and improving criticism are damaging this fame also. 
The passages from Hume cited by Lord Brougham as " magnificent,'* 
do not so impress me. Others, not quoted, such as his. description 
of Charles the First's execution, are most graceful and picturesque. 



LECTURE FIRST. 



Shakspeare's admirable description of poetic genius, one 
of its noblest attributes is, that it glances from earth 
to beaven. Nowhere has this been more finely ex- 
emplified than in his own ^^Chronicle-Plays." If the 
Grreek drama was controlled by Destiny, — the despotism 
of a blind, inexorable Fate, — the Christian historical 
drama has a Providence for its leading idea. In the 
periods of history which I propose to examine and 
illustrate by the English historical plays of Shakspeare, 
it will be seen that, while he embodies a great va- 
riety of human character and passions, he shows it all 
as an agency in the providential government of the 
world. After disposing of the early history, I hope to 
be able to show to those who may accompany me in this 
course of lectures, how the guilt that hung over the 
usurpation of King John brought not only retribution 
on himself, but unmerited misery upon the innocent 
Arthur — ^how the giddy tyranny and the frailties of the 
second Richard found sad expiation in a tragic death. 
We may there trace the fortunes of the Lancastrian 
kings, from the elevation of Bolingbroke, onward, 
through the martial glories of his son's reign, to the 
disastrous civil wars of the Roses. In the last of these 
historical dramas, we shall see one of the noblest tragic 
representations of the mutability of earthly power; and 
we may contemplate the sublime, historical impartiality 
with which the poet has portrayed the splendid and 
haughty career of England's Great Cardinal. 

As a "per contra to Lord Brougham's excessive panegyric on Hume, 
the student is referred to an admirable article entitled "Hume and 
his Influence on History," in vol. Ixxiii. p. 536, of the Quarterly Re- 
view. W. B. R. 



ON THE STUDY 0¥ HISTORY. 45 



In conclusion, let me say, that, apart altogether from 
the mode of treating it, I cannot, for one moment, dis- 
trust the intrinsic interest of the subject of this course 
of lectures. It is a subject of ample magnitude; and 
of this I have become more deeply sensible the more I 
have dwelt upon it since I first proposed it to my mind. 
It is, therefore, with no afi"ectation of modesty that I 
assure you I have a strong feeling that these lectures 
must be very inadequate to a subject which grows in 
my thoughts as I work upon it. The subject is a new 
one, too — I mean, as to the mode of treating it ; and it 
will demand much care and study to keep the historic 
and poetic elements in just proportions. In this, I have 
no authority or example to guide me. 

I will endeavour to give the' subject an interest and 
value in the minds of those who will accompany me in 
the course; but if I should not succeed in this, remem- 
ber what I tell you now, — the fault is in me, and not in 
my subject. 



LECTUKE II* 

f^e l^jegenbarg ^eriob of grrtaiit: ^ing 3^£ar. 

Legendary period prior to the Roman invasion — Julius Caesar — Ma- 
lone's comment — Fabulous antiquity of British kings — Brutus of 
Troy — Authentic ancient history limited to Southern Europe — 
Britain out of the path of the ancient world — Faber's idea of the 
Mediterranean — Milton's History of England — Faith in ancient 
legends — Claim of Edward the First to the sovereignty of Scotland 
— The Papal reference — Difference of British and classical legends 
— Gi-rote on Greek legends — Minstrelsy and romance — Washington, 
in our sense, a legendary idea in America — Lives of the saints — 
Symbolical legends — Popular faith in legends — Identified with 
reverence for ancestry — Sir Robert Walpole's false idea of history — 
Niebuhr — Modern colonies — King Lear a dramatic legend — Filial 
relation — Illustrations appropriate to paganism — Lear's invocation 
of heathen gods — Charles Lamb's criticism on Lear. 

In the examination of tlie period of history, whicli 
forms the subject of these lectures^ I shall follow 
chronological order as the most natural arrangement. 
I am, therefore, now led back into that dim, or rather 
dark, region of historical knowledge, which may be fitly 
described as the legendary period of British history. 
Amid the multitude of stories or fables which belong to 
these times, one found its way to the heart of Shak- 
speare; and, by the wondrous alchemy of his genius, 
it was transmuted into, perhaps, the most impressive and 

* December 15th, 1846. 
46 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OF BRITAIN. 47 



awful tragedy in the whole range of dramatic literature. 
The obscure and neglected legend lives, by transmigration, 
in that imperishable drama, which shows us the royal and 
the parental misery of the breaking heart of King Lear. 
The legendary period of British history is to be under- 
stood as embracing those ages, which, beginning in a dis- 
tant and indefinite antiquity, end with the opening of 
authentic annals. That authentic history begins under 
the unfavourable circumstances of observation which is 
limited and prejudiced, for it is found in the military 
narrative of a Roman soldier, who met the Britons in 
bloody warfare. The scanty information to be derived 
from Julius Caesar's memoirs of his campaigns is, at 
best, the description of an enemy and a Boman; and, 
in judging of the value of such testimony, it should be 
borne in mind, that, whatever were the virtues of the 
Roman character, and whatever praise there may be in 
calling a man, now-a-days, an ^^old Roman,^' there was 
found among that people little of veracity or magna- 
nimity in their dealings with their enemies. Still, 
though the narrative by Caesar is not entitled to entire 
confidence, it does give the first solid footing for English 
history to stand upon. We learn certain facts from it, 
distorted and coloured though they be by the medium 
through which they have come to us. We can believe 
that the great triumvir, after having led his legions in 
victory from one province of Gaul into another, found a 
new adversary, when the Britons crossed the narrow 
channel of the sea to help the kindred people who dwelt 
in Armorica — there where, at this present tinie, their 
descendants are found, I mean, that very peculiar race 
who occupy the north-western corner of France, the 



4* LECTURE SECOND. 



province of Brittany. When the subjugation of Gaul 
was completed, Caesar, revolving, perhaps, his plans 
ag-ainst the freedom of the republic, looked round and 
beheld on one side the dark and impenetrable forests 
of Germany, and on the other what appeared the more 
accessible and easy conquest of the almost unknown land 
of the Britons. He looked to the white cliffs of these 
shores, perhaps with a revengeful eye against the con- 
federates of his Gallic enemy — perhaps impelled to con- 
tinued war by the fire of that lust of conquest, which 
burned in the heart of Roman soldiers for eight centuries 
and more — burned until it was quenched, not only by 
exhaustion, but by the fulfilment of providential purposes. 
Whatever was the impulse — whether these, or the im- 
probable and meaner one, which has been imputed to 
Caesar by one of his own countrymen, the coveting of 
British pearls — the invasion of Britain added nothing to 
Roman power or pride.* The eagles were fluttered in 
their flight; and, when thanks were given at Rome to 
the gods, it may well be questioned, as Milton intimates 
in his History of England, whether it was for a conquest 
or an escape — whether it was for an exploit done or for a 
discovery made. At the end of the campaigns, the con- 
queror of Britain was not master of one foot of British 
ground; not a Roman colonist was left in the land; and 
Julius Caesar, at his return to Rome, dedicated to the god- 
dess Yenus a corslet of these British pearls — a gift, which 

* Tacitus, Vit. Agricolse cap. xii. Cicero ad Att. iv. 16. Ad Fam. 
vii. 7. Lingard, ch. i. The authority alluded to in the text was, 
doubtless, Suetonius, C. Julius Caesar s. 47 : — " Britanniam petisse, spe 
margaritarum, quarum amplitudinem conferentem, interdum su^ manii 
exegisse pondus " W. B. R. 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OP BRITAIN. 49 



was^ perhaps, the more precious from the fact, that the 
Romans went home with no inclination to renew the 
search for that kind of jewels. 

It is certain that, in the invasion of Britain, Caesar 
encountered a foe who caused a dismay, from which even 
the discipline of his veteran legions with difficulty rallied; 
and I must confess that, while we applaud the heroism of 
the standard-bearer of the tenth legion, I have a deeper 
sympathy with the rude barbarians who gathered by 
thousands to defend their native shores. If it was true 
martial virtue for the Roman to leap into the waves and 
bid his hesitating fellow-soldiers follow him, there was a 
nobler spirit in those undaunted Britons, who rushed into 
the sea to strike the invader before his foot polluted their 
soil. 

It is not my intention to dwell upon such familiar pas- 
sages in history as the descent of Julius Caesar on the 
British shore ; but I could hardly say less in asking your 
attention to the manner in which the authentic history 
of Britain has its beginning, with that event, about fifty 
years before the birth of our Saviour. It is the practice 
of the later writers of English history to make no attempt 
to present any narrative of the earlier period, which is 
abandoned as purely legendary or hopelessly involved in 
fable or confused tradition. It should be understood, 
however, that, in doing so, they pursue a course very dif- 
ferent from that of the early historians of England, who 
had no fear in looking into a very remote antiquity, and 
no difficulty in persuading themselves that they saw a 
great deal there. They dealt with their eras of a thou- 
sand years with a magnificent assurance, and marshalled 
kings and dynasties of kings in complete chronology and 



50 LECTURE SECOND. 



exact succession. Tliey carried their elaborate genealogy 
so far beyond the Olympiads, tbat, by tlie side of it, 
Greek and Roman history seems a tiling of yesterday. 
British antiquity is made to run parallel with Egypt's 
ancient lore, and with the prophets, and kings, and 
judges of Israel. It stops at the Deluge, and is every 
thing but antediluvian. 

This confident chronology of the chroniclers startles us 
with its boldness and its minute accuracy ; and, indeed, 
it seems fantastic, if not ludicrous, when we are gravely 
told of one British king flourishing in the time of Saul, 
and another being contemporary with Solomon ; and that 
it was in the period of the prophet Isaiah that King Lear 
was ruler in the land. Yet this mythical chronology 
appears to have been for so long a time part of the popu- 
lar literature of England, and to have taken such hold 
on the mind, that one of the commentators on Shak- 
speare thinks it worth while to remark, that the name of 
Nero is introduced in King Lear about three hundred 
years before he was born ; and another commentator on 
the same passage, where Edgar says that " Nero was an 
angler in the lake of darkness,'^ goes still more seriously 
to work in the way of correction, by remarking that "this 
is one of Shakspeare's most remarkable anachronisms; 
for that King Lear succeeded his father Bladud in the 
year of the world 3105, and Nero, in the year 4017, was 
sixteen years old when he married Octavia, Caesar's 
daughter.^' '^ Surely, the fancies and fables of the 



* Grote's History of Greece, vol. i. 642, Eng. ed.; 485, Am. ed. This 
whole suhjeet is discussed by Mr. Grote, and thence the hints in the 
lecture were obviously taken. Mr. Grote's note is this: — "Dr. 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OF BRITAIN. 61 



romancers and chroniclers liad as mucli of wisdom in 
them as there is in such commentary. Who^ as he gives 
his heart up to the study of this grand tragedy, ever 
heeds or thinks of the chronology ? In the course of this 
lecture I will endeavour to show, that the poetic truth is 
preserved, so far as the drama stands in relation to an 
age and a land of paganism; but, besides that, it mat- 
tered not in what particular centuiy the story was cast, 
or whether it corresponded with the history of other 
countries. From the legends of Britain, Shakspeare 
culled the story as one which he felt the power of his 
imagination could make as universal, and as perpetual, as 
the human heart — that he could create a sympathy with 
it, which, growing out of the relation of father and child, 
must endure as long as the earth is peopled. What need 
the poet care for the violation of a fabulous chronology, 
when he was giving poetic reality to the sublime passion 
of Lear, and when, in the character of Cordelia, he was 
creating such a personification of all that is graceful and 
dutiful in womanly nature — a being, the very embodi- 
ment of filial piety, whom every parent, the wide world 
over, may bless, and every daughter reverence ? 

I have spoken of the authentic history of Britain be- 



Zachary Grey has the following observations in his ' Xotes on Shak- 
speare/ (London, 1754, vol. i. p. 112.) In commenting on the passage 
in King Lear — 

* Xero is an angler in the lake of darkness/ 

he says : — ' This is one of Sbakspeare's most remarkable anachronisms. 
King Lear succeeded his father Bladud a.m. 3105; and Nero, A. jt, 
4017, was sixteen years old when he married Octavia, Caesar's daugh- 
ter.'" W. B. R. 



52 LECTURE SECOND. 



ginning only when tlie inhabitants of that country came 
in contact^ or rather collision, with the Romans; and 
this may lead us to the consideration, that all the authen- 
tic history of the ancient world — its sacred and profane 
history — is almost entirely limited to the story of those 
races of men, who dwelt on the borders of the Mediterra- 
nean. The region of that great inland sea is the domain 
of ancient history. As you pass away from the sound of 
its waves, the voice of history dies away with it ; and the 
countless generations, that lived and died at a distance 
from the shores of the midland sea, have hardly more 
place in our thoughts than if they had been the inhabit- 
ants of another planet. We read the history of the 
Israelites and of Egypt, the history of the Grreeks and 
the history of the Romans, and this we call ancient his- 
tory; and then we think we have read the history of all 
the ancient world : yet it is the story of only those who 
occupied a small belt of the earth's surface. The light 
of history seems to fade unless it is reflected from the 
glancing waters of the bright Mediterranean; and we 
scarce recognise the existence of mankind dwelling in 
the vast spaces of the North, and the East, and the 
South. The Celt and the Cambrian, the Briton and the 
German, are known only when Rome is waging war with 
them or is dismayed at their approach. "We must come 
to the borders of the Adriatic and the ^gean shores, or 
to where the Nile pours its turbid current to the sea, to 
find the history of the Old World; for, elsewhere, it is 
either a desert vacancy of historical knowledge, or else 
what was once known has passed into dark oblivion. 
The tribes that moved on many a Northern plain have 
kept no kindred with the nations of history, and many 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OF BRITAIN. 63 



a mighty empire has passed forever out of the memory 
of man. 

" Palmyra, central in the desert/'* 

is no more than a name; and 

" Babylon, 
Learned and wise, hath perished utterly, 
Nor leaves her speech one word to aid the sigh 
That would lament her."f 

Britain did not lie in the path of the ancient world. I 
am very sure that when we think of ancient history, we 
do not adequately or distinctly conceive what vast spaces 
of the earth are left untouched. 

We have, I am inclined to think, a kind of ill-defined 
notion, that all the races of men had gathered either to 
the west of Asia, or the north of Africa, or to the sunny 
regions of Southern Europe. The great highway of the 
human race seems to us to have been the Mediterranean 
Sea alone; and certainly there is no spectacle on the 
earth which can call up so many historic memories — 
such throngs of thoughts associated with other ages. If 
each wild wave upon its surface were vocal, it might 
speak a history; for all that was glorious in profane 
story, and all that was holy in sacred, centred there. 
It is the natural expression of a thoughtful mind, when 
a modern traveller thus describes his first sight of the 
great and beautiful sea that touches the shores of three 
continents : — "I was looking upon the Mediterranean: it 
was the first time those haunted waters had met my gaze 



* The Excursion, book viii, p. 626, Am. ed. 

■j "Wordsworth's Sonnet on Missions and Travels, p. 352; 



54 LECTURE SECOND. 



I pondered on tlie name — the Mediterranean — as if the 
very letters had folded in their little characters the secret 
of my joy. My inner eye roved in and out along the 
coasts of religious Spain, the land of an eternal crusade, 
where alone, and for that reason, the true religiousness 
of knighthood was ever realized; it overleaped the straits 
and followed the outline of St. Augustine's land, where 
Carthage was and rich Cyrene ; onward it went to ' old 
hushed Egypt,' the symbol of spiritual darkness, and the 
mystical house of bondage; from thence to Jaffa, from 
Jaffa to Beyroot; the birthplace of the Morning, the 
land of the world's pilgrimage, where the Tomb is, lay 
stretched out like a line of light, and the nets were 
drying on the rocks of Tyi'e; onward still along that 
large projection of Asia, the field ploughed and sown by 
apostolic husbandmen; then came a rapid glance upon 
the little ^gean islands, and upward through the Helles- 
pont; and, over the Sea of Marmora, St. Sophia's mina- 
ret sparkled like a star ; the sea-surges were faint in the 
myriad bays of Greece, and that other peninsula, twice 
the throne of the world's masters, was beautiful in her 
peculiar twilight."* 



* Faber's "Sights and Thoughts," p. 112. My brother had read 
this volume some years before, and was much delighted with it. 
\VYriting to a friend, in 1842, he says : — " I have been reading aloud 
m'Vmy one listener (Charles Lamb's idea of an audience) Faberte 
Sights and Thoughts in Foreign Churches and among Foreign Peoples. 
It is a remarkable production — very bold and very beautiful — one 
of the most imaginative and fanciful prose books I ever read — very, 
very Oxfordish in its fashion of sentiment and reflection — abounding 
in architectural spirit which would delight you, and Wordsworthian 
deeply, saving an occasional censoriousness which he ought to cure. 
But I found it one of those books which I delight in floating along 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OF BRITAIN. 55 



Britain was too remote from the region of tlie Mediter- 
ranean to have any place in ancient history ; and all that 
was known of it was, that it must have been peopled at 
an early age of the world, and that it was occasionally 
visited by some of the maritime people of the South for 
purposes of traffic. This long tract of time is not, how- 
ever, left wholly a blank, for the legendary story tells us, 
that the Britons were descended from Trojan ancestry, 
and take their name from Brutus, who came from Troy 
to the shores of a land called ^'Albion,^^ and conquered 
the inhabitants. Such is the story of national origin 
given by all the early English chroniclers, who narrate 
also the succession of a long dynasty of kings — " sprung 
of old Anchises* line" — who ruled over Britain in times 
very long ago. It is the very witchcraft of history ; and, 
as we read in these legendary annals the name of one 
king after another, they pass before the mind, visionary 
creations like the shadows of the kings that the weird 
sisters showed to Macbeth, — one ^^ gold-bound brow is like 
the first, a third is like the former," — and others more 
shadowy still, like the images of the many more reflected 
in the glass of the spectral Banquo. In the history of 
England written by Milton, he precisely enumerates this 
series of ancient sovereigns according to the traditions, 
which he recapitulates dutifully, though with something 
like impatience, when, in one part of his narrative, he has 
to speak of " twenty kings in a continued row, who either 

the tide of, though, in this case, there are some ugly snags and saw- 
yers in the stream. The volume abounds in deep and beautiful re- 
flections clothed in prose most musical. In one or two places its 
beauty is marred by some John Bullish impudence about America," 
MS. Letter, July 23, 1842. W. B. R. 



56 LECTURE SECOND. 



did nothing or lived in ages tliat wrote nothing — a foul 
pretermission/' he adds, ''in the author of this, whether 
story or fable, himself weary, as seems, of his own tedious 
tale." These negative sovereigns are succeeded by one 
who is recorded to have excelled all before him in the art 
of music, whereupon Milton quaintly laments that he 
''did not leave us one song of his twenty predecessors' 
doings;" and, on reaching the confines of authentic his- 
tory, he likens the change to the approach of " dawn to 
one who had set out on his way by night and travelled 
through a region of smooth or idle dreams."* 

The very origin of this legendary British history is 
wrapped in obscurity. It was circulated chiefly by the 
chronicle of Greoffrey of Monmouth, a Welsh ecclesiastic, 
who flourished in the twelfth century; but, as the legend 
of the Trojan migration and settlement in Britain is 
traced back to still earlier writers, it is reasonable to 
believe, that the chronicle was either a translation from 
the British into the Latin language of an ancient history 
of Britain found in Armorica, or a compilation of all the 
stories and fables which had currency in the shape of 
Welsh songs and oral traditions among the descendants 
of the Britons. It would be a weary, and probably vain, 
inquiry to consider minutely the claims which such his- 
torical materials have on our belief; and so little is there 
attractive in the legends of British history, that I need 
not attempt to dwell upon any of the alleged facts. But 
I wish, before passing from this part of my subject, 
briefly to examine the curious tenacity with which the 
belief in this legendai-y literature was once held, and to 

* History of Britain, pp. 36, 37. 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OF BRITAIN. 67 



show that it was not relinquislied until a more critical 
standard of historic belief was adopted, and scientific 
investigation took the place of uninquiring and passive 
credulity. It has been said that no man, before the six- 
teenth century, presumed to doubt that the Britons were 
descended from Brutus the Trojan; and it is equally cer- 
tain that no modern writer could presume confidently to 
assert it. 

Let us turn to Milton's history of England; for, if it 
were only as a psychological speculation, it will be curious 
to observe how such a subject was regarded by a mascu- 
line and mighty mind, in which, too, there was a feeling 
very far removed from reverence for monastic legendary 
lore. I have already noticed his scarce-repressed impa- 
tience, as he rehearsed some passages in the history which 
he dismisses with these words: — ''I neither oblige the 
belief of other persons, nor hastily subscribe my own. 
Nor have I stood with others computing or collating 
years and chronologies, lest I should be vainly curious 
about the time and circumstance of things whereof the 
substance is so much in doubt." When he introduces 
the subject, after having summarily disposed of the sto- 
ries anterior to the Trojan legend, it is with these words, 
in which it is easy to trace a lingering respect for the 
time-honoured legends : — ^^ Of Brutus and his line, with 
the whole progeny of kings to the entrance of Julius 
Caesar, we cannot so easily be discharged — descents of 
ancestry long-continued, laws and exploits not plainly 
seeming to be borrowed or devised, which, on the com- 
mon belief, have wrought no small impression, defended 
by many, denied utterly by few. For what though 
Brutus and the whole Trojan pretence were yielded up, 



6S LECTURE SECOND. 



(seeing they wlio first devised to bring us from some 
noble ancestor were content at first witb Brutus the 
Consul^ till better inventions^ though not willing to forego 
the name, taught them to remove it higher into a more 
fabulous age; and, by the same remove, lighting on the 
Trojan tales, in affectation to make the Briton of one 
original with the Roman, pitched there,) yet those old 
and inborn names of successive kings never any to have 
been real persons, or done in their lives at least some 
part of what has been so long remembered, cannot be 
thought without too strict an incredulity. * * * For 
these and the causes above mentioned, that which has 
received approbation from so many I have chosen not to 
omit. Certain or uncertain, — ^be that upon the credit of 
those whom I must follow, — so far as keeps aloof from 
impossible and absurd, attested by ancient writers from 
books more ancient, I refuse not as the due and proper 
subject of story. ''"^ 

It is not difficult to observe in this a conflict in the 
mind of Milton between his feelings and his judgment; 
on the one hand, a lingering respect for a long- continued 
and habitual popular belief, and, on the other, the sense 
of the destitution of historical testimony. And, indeed, 
with whatever superciliousness we may now look upon 
this old traditional history, it was no slight thing to 
sweep coldly and sternly away all that, for centuries, had 
found ready acceptance in the minds of men — the inno- 
cent superstitions of their country's annals. Milton 
shared in a measure the spirit of the English chroniclers 
who flourished before his day, and shows some sympathy 

* History of Britain, pp. 10-37. 



LEGrNDAKY TERIOD OF BRITAIN. 59 



with the zeal with which they strove against a growing 
incredulity, which, by converting the legendary history 
into pure fable, would destroy with a breath whole dynas- 
ties of kings and the exploits and adventures of their 
forefathers during centuries. But they were striving 
against the progress of the science of history, in which 
the annalist and chronicler stand midway between ro- 
mance or heroic legend, and genuine history. 

It is most dif&cult for us, in these later days of higher 
standards of historic credibility, to form any thing like an 
adequate conception of the entire and unquestioning con- 
fidence, which was felt for the story of British origin and 
the race of ancient British kings. Of this feeling there 
is a curious proof in a transaction in the reign of Edward 
the First, when the sovereignty of Scotland was claimed 
by the English monarch. The Scots sought the inter- 
position and protection of the Pope, alleging that the 
Scottish realm belonged of right to the See of Rome. 
Boniface the Eighth, a pontiff not backward in asserting 
the claims of the papacy, did interpose to check the Eng- 
lish conquest, and was answered by an elaborate and 
respectful epistle from Edward, in which the English 
claim is most carefully and confidently derived from the 
conquest of the whole country by the Trojans in the 
times of Eli and Samuel — assuredly, a very respectable 
antiquity of some two thousand four hundred years. iS'o 
Philadelphia estate could be more methodically traced 
back to the proprietary title of AVilliam Penn, than was 
this claim to Scotland up to Brutus, the exile from Troy. 
The names of the successors of Brutus, in a long lineage, 
are regularly stated, with various facts, which are asserted 
as having unquestionably existed from antiquity in the 



LECTURE SECOND. 



memory of men — ^^procul dubio ah antiquo^' — and the 
Pope is respectfully entreated, at the same time, not 
to be deluded by cunningly devised and fantastical for- 
geries. Now, all this is set fortb with the most im- 
perturbable seriousness, and with an air of complete 
assurance of the truth. It appears, too, to have fully 
answered the purpose intended; and the Scots, finding 
that the papal antiquity was but a poor defence against 
such claims, and as if determined not to be outdone by 
the Southron, replied in a document asserting their inde- 
pendence by virtue of descent from Scota, one of the 
daughters of Pharaoh. The Pope seems to have been 
silenced in a conflict of ancestral authority, in which the 
succession of St. Peter seemed quite a modern affair, 
when overshadowed by such Trojan and Egyptian an- 
tiquity.* 

Confidently as this early history of Britain was once 
believed, and reluctantly as it was gradually discredited, 
it cannot be said to possess, at least in its present condi- 
tion, any historic value. But when we consider that in 
our own day a great historical mind like Niebuhr's has 
actually made discoveries of historic truth in what used 
to appear so inextricably fabulous as the early history of 
Rome; when such historical sagacity as his has been suc- 
cessfully employed, not to teach a sweeping skepticism, 
but a just discrimination between what was actual and 
what was fable; and when we see a mind so zealous after 
truth as Arnold's, carefully cherishing the Roman le- 
gends, not, indeed, as history, but as illustrative of it — 
we may venture a thought, that haply it may be reserved 



Lingard, vol. ii. pp. 564, 565. 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OF BRITAIN. 61 



for some historian in like manner to search out the truth 
that now is buried beneath the mass of the old British 
legends. There is, to be sure, this important difference 
between them and the legends of Greece and Rome, that 
the latter were native to the inhabitants of those lands, 
that they sprang up among them, and therefore were 
illustrative of the feelings and the mind of the nation in 
a far greater degree than can be claimed by the Welsh 
and British traditions. The most recent English histo- 
rian of G-reece, in speaking of that part of his work 
which he has devoted to the legendary period, uses this 
lanfmao-e : 

^'I describe the earlier times by themselves, as con- 
ceived by the faith and feeling of the first Greeks, and 
known only through their legends — without presuming to 
measure how much or how little of historical matter 
these legends may contain. If the reader blames me for 
not assisting him to determine this — if he ask me why I 
do not undraw the curtain and disclose the picture — I 
reply in the words of the painter Zeuxis, when the same 
question was addressed to him on exhibiting his master- 
piece of imitative art — ' The curtain is the picture !' 
What we now read as poetry and legend was once ac- 
credited history, and the only genuine history which the 
first Greeks could conceive or relish of their past time : 
the curtain conceals nothing behind, and cannot, by any 
ingenuity, be withdrawn."* 

Now, to apply this to the legendary history of Britain, 
there is such uncertainty as to its origin — such doubt 
whether it was not of foreign instead of domestic growth. 

* Preface to Grote's History of Greece, vol. i. p. xiii 



G2 LECTURE SKCOND. 



that we cannot say in reference to it that ^'The curtain is 
the picture." The legend of the Trojan ancestry of the 
Britons has, indeed, great antiquity. Sir Francis Pal- 
grave — a high authority — in his learned work on the 
English Commonwealth, speaks of it as a doubtful point, 
whether the stories on that subject existed before the 
arrival of the Romans, or whether the adventures of 
Brutus were invented by the bards, to propitiate the 
favour of those who also prided themselves on being the 
progeny of ^neas. 

The legendary history of nations has filled so large a 
space in historical literature, that it has been truly pro- 
nounced an universal manifestation of the human mind, 
belonging to what is called the age of historical faith as 
distinguished from historical reason.* Now, why is it 
that legendary history is composed, and why is it so long 
believed? Those who look on humanity with an evil 
eye, and speak of it with a satirical tongue, will say that 
it comes of man's propensity to falsehood. This is a solu- 
tion more simple and superficial than satisfactory. It 
must be some deep and prevailing, but I hope better, 
feeling that gives birth to legendary lore. The heart 
of a nation, as it grows strong, craves for knowledge of 
its ancestry; and, if there be no historical records, if 
naught else be forthcoming, the heroic lay, the minstrel's 
song, romance or epic poem, are produced to fill the blank 
spaces of the past. Even when there are genuine mate- 
rials of history, they are shaped and modified, and often 
made, as it were, legendary, by any strong and universal 
feeling in the heart of the people. To give a familiar 



Mr, Grote. 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OF BRITAIN. 63 



illustration of the controlling power of such sentiments, 
the profound and fervent reverence for the memory of 
"Washington so sways the popular historical conception of 
the war of independence, as to identify it almost wholly 
with his character and services — making him the ONE 
great champion of the cause. While it is known that 
much was achieved by the wisdom and fortitude of others, 
and that there was much that Washington had no part 
in, who for one moment could desire to disparage, or even 
critically to measure, that large and uncalculating homage, 
the justice of which is best proved by the depth and fer- 
vour of it ? And it is the highest evidence of the reality 
of his fame, that all nicer estimates are mastered by this 
judgment of the heart, which makes the history of the 
Revolution centre around him. 

It has been ingeniously and truly said — ''We all write 
legends. Who has not observed in himself, in his ordi- 
nary dealings with the facts of everyday life, with the 
sayings and doings of his acquaintances, in short, with 
every thing which comes before him as a fact^ a disposi- 
tion to forget the real order in which they appear, and to 
rearrange them according to his theory of how they ought 
to be ? Do we hear of a generous, self-denying action, — 
In a short time the real doer and it are forgotten ; it has 
become the property of the noblest person we know. So 
a jest we relate of the wittiest person; frivolity of the 
most frivolous ; and so on. Each particular act we attri- 
bute to the person we conceive most likely to have been 
the author of it. And this does not arise from any wish 
to leave a false impression, scarcely from carelessness; but 
only because facts refuse to remain bare and isolated id 
our memory: they will arrange themselves under somf» 



64 LECTURE SECOND. 



law or other ; they must illustrate something to us — some 
character^ some principle — or else we forget them. Facts 
are thus perpetually^ so to say, becoming unfixed and re- 
arranged in a more conceptional order. In this way we 
find fragments of Jewish history in the legends of Greece ; 
stories from Herodotus become naturalized in the tradition 
of early Rome ; and the mythic exploits of the Northern he- 
roes, adopted by the biographers of Saxon kings. So with 
the great objects of national interest. Alfred, ^England's 
darling/ the noblest of the Saxon kings, became mythic 
almost before his death ; and, forthwith, every institution 
that Englishmen most value, of law or church, became 
appropriated to him. He divided England into shires — 
He established trial by jury — He destroyed wolves — and 
made the country so secure, that golden bracelets hung 
untouched in the open road. And when Oxford was 
founded, a century was added to its age, and it was dis- 
covered that Alfred had laid the first stone of the first 
college.'' Again, it is said, — '^ Time, in another way, 
plays strange tricks with facts, and is ever altering, shift- 
ing, and even changing their nature in our memory. 
Everyman's past life is becoming mythic to him; we 
cannot call up again the feelings of our childhood ; only 
we know that what then seemed to us the bitterest mis- 
fortunes, we have since learnt by change of character or 
circumstance to think very great blessings; and even 
when there is no change, and were they to recur again, 
they are such as we should equally repine at; yet, by 
mere lapse of time, sorrow is turned to pleasure, and the 
sharpest pang at present becomes the most alluring object 
of our retrospect. The sick bed, the school trial, loss of 
friends, pain and grief of every kind, become rounded off 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OF BRITAIN. 



and assume a soft and beautifal grace. The harshest 
facts are smoothed and chastened off in the past like the 
rough mountains and jagged rocks in the distant horizon. 
And so it is with every other event of our lives; read a 
letter we wrote ten years ago, and how impossible we find 
it to recognise the writer in our altered selves. Incident 
after incident rises up and bides its day, and then sinks 
back into the landscape. It changes by distance, and 
we change by age. While it was present it meant one 
thing, now it means another; and to-morrow, perhaps, 
something else on the point of vision alters. Even old 
Nature, endlessly and patiently reproducing the same 
forms, the same beauties, cannot reproduce in us the 
same emotions we remember in our childhood. Then, 
all was Fairy-land ; now, time and custom have deadened 
our sense, and 

* The things which we have seen we now can see no more.' 

This is the true reason why men people past ages with 
the superhuman and the marvellous. They feel their own 
past was, indeed, something miraculous, and they cannot 
adequately represent their feelings except by borrowing 
from another order of beings."* 

This is also to be considered — that, doubtless, many 
an early narrative was composed, not with claim to literal 
belief, but as legends in the true sense of the term — pro- 
ductions intended to be read for example and instruction, 
given to simple, uncriticising folk, as moral apologues are 
to children. We judge them, therefore, perhaps by a 
wrong standard, and look on them with contempt because 



* Lives of the English Saints, No. iv. pp. 75-78. 
5 



LECTURE SECOND. 



we lose sight of their moral purpose. Early history 
abounds with prodigies and portents, miraculous agencies 
and supernatural interpositions, stories that are sometimes 
impressive and often grotesque. Such things are accept- 
able to a certain condition of the human mind, and while 
they prevail there may be a great deal of stupid and 
superstitious credulity along with innocent docility of 
belief. Later ages grow beyond all this, but that growth 
is not necessarily all gain; for if irrational credulity be 
avoided, there is an opposite extreme — skepticism — infi- 
delity — atheism. Now, wild and extravagant and absurd 
as were the stories of the olden time, they did lead men 
to the belief that there is another world beyond that 
which we see ; that there are realities beyond the things 
which we can handle; and, still more, that there is a 
providential government of the world, and that, as the 
earth rolls on through the silent spaces of the firmament, 
Grod's hand is upon it, and that his eye is on the soul of 
each creature of the countless generations of men that 
rise up and sink into their graves. In the olden time 
men were, no doubt, very superstitious — very credulous — 
they believed a great deal that was monstrously absurd — 
they believed it simply because it was told to them — in 
short, they believed a great deal too much ; but in that 
excess of belief was comprehended a faith in the invalu- 
able truths which were just now referred to. Of such 
truths the early legends are symbolical; and, when my 
thoughts turn to a history like Hume's, I do not fear to 
say that it is also legendary in its own way, but the 
doctrine which it symbolizes is that there is no provi- 
dence over nations or men. I do not mean that he 
teaches this merely by silence, but by assertion or 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OF BRITAIN. 67 



insinuation, tliat the affairs of this world are governed by 
chance; and that whenever a religious feeling is manifest 
as an agency in human events, it is no divine impulse, 
but a delusion — a folly or a fraud, as if Grod in anger had 
cast this earth from him to roll onward with all its mise- 
rable freight of humanity beyond his sight and beyond 
his care. The early popular histories of England con- 
tained a large element of- belief, and the later history in 
most general use contains, in an equally large proportion, 
the element of unbelief; and surely it is, at the least, as 
irrational to believe too little as to believe too much. 

The popular faith in legendary history may be traced 
to a cause deep seated in human nature. With the pro- 
gress of cultivation, men become conscious of the high 
privilege of humanity of connecting itself with times that 
are gone by; and they feel that there is no more dismal 
condition than when the past is wholly lost to it. I do 
not mean the mere pride of ancestry, but that feeling 
with which the heart searches for its dead kindred. It 
is an universal sentiment of civilized humanity ; it is wit- 
nessed in an Old Mortality laboriously renewing the time- 
worn tombstones of the Covenanters, or in the great OVator 
of antiquity who knew the power of it, when, nearly two 
centuries after the great Athenian victory, he put at least 
a moment's fire into the hearts of his degenerate country- 
men as he adjured them by the dead at Marathon.* 
Every people, as they rise in virtue and intelligence, 
crave a history of their own ; and, for lack of that which 
is authentic, they welcome the imaginative legend and 
the rude chronicle. The genuine dignity of the nation 

* Demosthenes de Corona, s. 208. 



LECTURE SECOND. 



grows as its history gathers, and there is a moral power 
in the mere memory of an heroic age. The spirit of a 
people must he fed with its historic associations; its natu- 
ral food is the story of the good and great men of their 
blood ; deprived of that, it languishes and dies. If the 
legendary lore of the olden time appear to the severe 
judgment of later days to be puerile or fantastic, let it 
be remembered that it shows the aspiring spirit of the 
people, and that it is proof of that moral temper which, 
as has been well said, elevates the present by doing reve- 
rence to the past. The ready belief was given, not in 
weakness, but in strength, when men became conscious 
of that power in themselves, which is told of by Shak- 
speare in his simple and sublime description of man as a 
being "looking before and after.'^ This power and the 
historic feeling that comes with it, do not exist when 
man is in a state of barbarism. What is the past to 

him, 

" If his chief good and market of his time 
Be but to sleep and feed ?" 

This historical feeling is so closely connected with 
man's moral nature, that I believe we might safely infer 
from the condition of it the state of civilization of a 
people. It has been said of individual character, that — 

" The man whose eye 
Is ever on himself, doth look on one 
The least of Nature's works, — one who might move 
The wise man to that scorn, which wisdom holds 
tinlawful ever."* 



* Wordsworth's Lines left 'on a seat in a Yew-Trte, p. 38. 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OF BRITAIN. 



It is equally time of a generation of men ; for when, in 
its self-sufficiency, it separates itself from all that have 
gone before, it does so to its own grievous degradation. 
It is better that legendary associations with the past 
should be created if historic associations cannot be found; 
for a nation stands on the highest moral station when, 
looking back, it can appropriate the poet's words — 

"The thought of our past years in me doth breed 
Perpetual benediction."* 

The legendary history of Britain, which is now become 
so obsolete, did, in its own time, good service in helping 
to form the national character; and, doubtless, the people 
rightfully and worthily kept their faith in it as long as 
they did. It was far better than that vicious and so- 
phisticated skepticism, which would beggar us of the 
accumulated inheritance of past ages by destroying belief 
in the evidence. Everybody, probably, has heard the 
story that is told of Sir Robert Walpole, who, when his 
son, Horace Walpole, was about to read to him some his- 
torical production, interrupted him by saying, "Oh, do 
not read history, for that I know must be false !'' It 
was an appropriate sentiment ; for it was uttered by one 
who, during a long and prosperous administration, did as 
much as any minister that ever lived to demoralize the 
government and the people, and who, no doubt, formed 
his estimate of history from the performances of the venal 
party-writers in his service; and whom, as Lord Mahon 
says in his history, " he hired as he hired the ditchers on 

* Ode on Intimations of lamortality, p. 471. 



70 LECTURE SECOND. 



his estate."* By the side of such a sentiment, ob- 
serve how much nobler a spirit is in the words of 
Niebuhr, when, speaking of the phrensy of the French 
E-e volution, he says that "Only once has the world 
beheld universal contempt invoked upon the whole of 
the past, and that, on the other hand, the lessons of 
all experience teach us, that a nation cannot possess a 
nobler treasure than the unbroken chain of a long and 
brilliant history. It is the want of this that makes all 
colonies so sickly. Those of the G-reeks, indeed, seldom 
cut off their recollections altogether from the root of their 
mother city. Modern colonies have done so; and this 
unnatural outrage has, perhaps, operated still more than 
other circumstances to plunge them into a state of incor- 
rigible depravity. ''f 

* History of England, vol. ii. p. 240. 

f Niebuhr's exact words are these: — "Notwithstanding this 
solemnity and the perpetual abolition of the name of King, the 
Romans were far from reflecting an indiscriminate hatred on the 
memory of the monarchical times. The statues of the kings, and 
among them, it appears, even that of the last Tarquinius, were pre- 
served and probably multiplied. Their laws and institutions, in civil 
as well as religious matters, continued to exist in full efficacy. The 
change of the constitution originally affected only a single branch; 
and it never was the intention of the Romans to despoil themselves 
of a rich inheritance of laws and reminiscences. It is only in our 
own days that men have witnessed the consequences of that phrensy 
which, with a species of pride hitherto unparalleled, entailed upon 
itself humiliation and slavery, while it laid claim to unexampled per- 
fection and boasted to form a new world from the chaos. Only once 
has the world seen (and we have seen) a general contempt of the past 
excited, and men priding themselves in the title of emancipated 
slaves. Something similar, indeed, and somewhat similar results, 
were experienced in the religious revolutions. The Protestant 
churches ha\e thrown aside the Saints and Fathers, and suffered in 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OF BRITAIN. 



In quoting these words of Niebuhr's^ I cannot forbear 
adding wbat may appear a sligbt digression^ but is really 
in further illustration of my subject. It is, I think, 
in the freedom from this reproach on modern colonies 
that our own country had so much of moral strength in 
its transition from the colonial to the national condition. 
The British colonists in America never did cut off their 
recollections from the root of their mother country; and 
accordingly when resistance became necessary, they were 
fortified in it by the feeling that they were contending 
for no new-born freedom, but for ancient rights; and 
that thus they were keeping, and not breaking, covenant 
witb the mighty dead. In England, Burke, at the out- 
set, warned his countrymen what would be the character 
of the colonial resistance; because, he said, a favourite 
study with the colonists was English law. There never 
was an instance in which it was more momentous as a 
matter of education — and I use that word in its most 
comprehensive sense — to preserve and teach the history 
of a nation. The revolutionary period of our annals must 
be so presented to the reason and the imagination in the 
American mind as to make it — what there is ample 
materials for making it — an historical, and not a fabulous, 



consequence. It is the same in science and literature. But, on the 
contrary, the experience of universal history attests that a nation can 
possess no wealth more splendid than a long and brilliant antiquity. 
All colonies languish under this defect. Those of the Greeks seldom 
•wholly rent themselves in recollection from the stock of the parent 
state; modern colonies have done so, and have sunk by that unna 
tural abruption, perhaps still more than by any other circumstances, 
into incurable deterioration." Niebuhr's Rome, by Walter, vol- L 
p. 338. W. B. R. 



72 LECTURE SECOND. 



heroic age. It must be cultivated, not only because it is 
the past, with wMcli we are immediately connected, but 
because it does not stop tbere. No one can adequately 
comprebend tbe American Revolution, unless be goes far 
beyond it into a more distant past along tbe line of tbe 
progress of constitutional freedom — beyond tbe Great 
Cbarter — ^beyond tbe laws of Edward tbe Confessor — to 
tbe times of tbe saintly and beroic Alfred ; for it is a 
precious trutb, tbat tbe war of our independence was a 
wave of wbat a great poet bas called — 

"The flood 
Of British freedom which, to the open sea 

Of the -world's praise, from dark antiquity 
Hath flowed.'-'--^ 

Niebubr's words may be applied in justification of tbe 
legendary bistory I bave been considering; for tbat 
brougbt to tbose for wbom it was written, as genuine 
bistory sbould bring to us — 

" Ennobling impulse from the past." 

Tbe generations of mankind are passing over tbe 
eartb — swiftly, one wave of tbem after anotber, break- 
ing on tbe sbores of eternity; but it is not like tbe 
wild waves of tbe sea, tbat leave no more tban a little 
foam and a few weeds on tbe barren sand. Tbe 
generations of men fall ratber like tbe leaves of tbe 
forest strewn by autumnal winds; but, as tbey perisb, 
tbey leave bebind tbem a fertilizing power ^on tbe 
soil, from wbicb otber trees grow to live in tbe ligbt 

* Wordsworth, p. 255. Sonnet. 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OF BRITAIN. 73 



of other summers^ aod to battle with the winds of other 
winters. 

In considering the legendary period of Britain^ I have 
only alluded to the sublime tragedy which Shakspeare 
has created out of one of the simple stories which form 
the mythology of that age. By attempting to say more 
than I have done of the tragedy of King Lear, I should 
have been making a vain effort to extract from it more 
of historical illustration than it gives, and which we can- 
not expect to find until we come to the tragedy of King 
John and the other, properly, ^^CAroTiicZe-Plays.'^ But I 
now proceed to what does belong to my present course, 
and add a few remarks on the historical relations of the 
tragedy of King Lear. 

The extended and abiding interest in this drama is 
produced by the genius of" the Poet appealing to the uni- 
versal feeling connected with the relation of parent and 
child — the common and instinctive sense of the hideous- 
ness of filial ingrcititude and of the beauty of filial piety. 
There would be deep pathos in the story of any aged 
father turned adrift by his ungrateful daughters, were 
the scene laid in any period of the world or in any condi- 
tion of society — be it of yesterday or of a thousand years 
ago — be it in palace or in cottage : but in the hands of 
Shakspeare it was to be raised to the highest sublimity, 
and the sympathy was to be made to sink into the lowest 
depths of the human heart. To achieve this, the won- 
drous sagacity of the poet sought for a remote period 
of history, where royalty still wore something of its 
patriarchal state, so that filial ingratitude should, at the 
same time, be treason, and filial piety be identified with 
all that is noble and beautiful in loyalty and truth. The 



74 LECTURE SECOND. 



king, abdicating his throne and making partition of his 
realm, is, at the same time, the fond father making over 
in his lifetime the inheritance to his children ; and on the 
ruins of parental authority there falls the fading splendour 
of sinking royalty. The cup of Lear's agony overflows 
with kingly and parental grief. Domestic discord is civil 
war; and when the natural and closest ties of blood are 
torn asunder by the inhuman daughters, the whole state 
of society is convulsed, and the realm is rent by crime and 
anarchy. The Poet knew, that it was only in an early 
social condition, and a simple patriarchal form of govern- 
ment, that his imagination could find ample space to show 
the uncontrolled misery which follows revolt against the 
laws of natural affection. In such a state of society there 
is nothing to counteract the appropriate consequences of 
such guilt. 

The scene of such a drama is well laid, too, in a pagan 
age and country. We have, it seems to me, on this ac- 
count a keener sense of the pitiable impotence of Lear, 
when we hear him in his moods of wrath or in his hours 
of misery swearing 

" By the sacred radiance of the sun. 
The mysteries of Hecate and the night," 

or invoking Nature for fierce retribution upon his own 
offspring. It would be harrowing — horrible, rather than 
tragic — to hear a Christian parent, even when so abused, 
imprecating curses on his children; it would be better 
for him to sink submissively under the burden of his 
wrongs. But the wild spirit of the heathen father's 
revenge is in harmony with his times; and appropriate to 
a mysterious and barbaric age is the sublime threatening 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OF BRITAIN. 



of his vengeance — sublime from its very indistinctness — 
as if too vast to sliape itself in thought or word — ^the 
most awful menace of revenge that ever burst from a 
father's heart in wrath upon the head of an impious 
child, when, in the agony of finding Goneril and Regan 
confederate against him, he exclaims to them — 

" I will do such things, — 
What they are, yet I know not; but they shall be 
The terrors of the earth." 

Again, placed as the drama is in the darkness of pa- 
ganism, the fury of the elements, when Lear is driven 
forth into the storm, acquires a wild significance, as if 
the lightning and the thunder were conscious powers of 
evil in mysterious alliance with, the wicked hearts of his 
daughters ; and when the passionate king swears by Ju- 
piter and Apollo, what can his heathen gods do to save 
him from such a wicked confederacy? The might of the 
malice of his daughters, and not less the tyranny of the 
pitiless storm, we are made to feel; and we see no power 
in a pagan creed to interpose against them.* It is as 
coming from the lips of a heathen that we feel, too, what 
has been finely spoken of as Lear's sublime identification 
of his age with that of the " Heavens themselves,'^ when, 
in his reproaches to them for conniving at the injustice 
of his children, he reminds them that they themselves 
are old.f 



* Dr. Johnson's note on this passage is, — " Shakspeare makes his 
Lear too much of a mythologist; he had Hecate and A.pollo before." 

W. B. K. 

f Lamb's Essay on Shakspeare's Tragedies. Prose Works, vol. i, 
p. 122. 



LECTURE SECOND. 



Sliakspeare lias been reproaclied with a deviation from 
history in the catastrophe of this tragedy. ^^ King 
Lear/^ as saith the story of the legend, ''again after 
three years obtained the crown. ^' The legend and 
the tragedy are each the production of imaginative 
art — the one of art in its rude form, and the other 
of art in its highest power. It was well enough in 
the simple fable to recompense the king for such 
wrongs and deprivations by giving him his sceptre and 
his crown again; but, after the intensity of suffering 
embodied in the tragedy — after the sublime accuniula- 
tion of wrongs and of anguish — after that majestic 
madness, in which Lear's heart was chastened, as his 
intellect was broken, what could be the appropriate 
sequel but death ? Indeed, in the words of Kent — that 
admirable personification of honour and humour and 
fidelity and manliness, the perfect gentleman in a bar- 
baric age — in his words as he stood by his expiring 
sovereign — 

** He hates him 
That would, upon the rack of this tough world, 
Stretch him out longer." 

The tragic poet cannot misrepresent the story of the 
life of our fallen and struggling human nature by the 
unnatural compensation of ''a happy ending."* It is 
well said by a German critic that " Tragedy, in its full 



* "A happy ending!" says Lamb; "as if the living martyrdom 
that Lear had gone through — the flaying of his feelings alive, did 
not make a fair dismissal from the stage of life the only decorous 
thing for him." W. B. R. 



LEGENDARY PERIOD OF BRITAIN. 



historical significance, was not made for tender, weak- 
nerved spirits. It requires strong shoulders to support 
the. whole burden of the tragical which the life of hu- 
manity contains.'^* 

* Ulrici's Shakspeare's Dramatic Art, p. 236. If the reader feel 
any disappointment at the brief comment of this lecture on the 
tragedy, I beg him to remember that these lectures are historico-criti- 
cal merely, and to refer to the first of the series in this volume on 
Tragic Poetry, where King Lear is critically considered. "W. B. R. 



LECTURE III.* 

Legendary history continued — Artegal and Elidure — The Northern 
and Southern nations — Geographical divisions of Europe — At- 
tempts of invasion frustrated — Rome sacked by the Gauls- 
Greece invaded and rescued — Defeat of Varus in the forest 
of Teutoburg — The memory of Arminius — Hermann — His un- 
finished monument — Decisive battles of the world — Professor 
Creasy 's volumes — The fall of the Roman Empire — Effect of 
Roman subjugation of Britain — British kings — Cymbeline a 
British king — Imogen — Roman remains in Britain — Sir Walter 
Scott and Ritson — Diocletian's persecution — Arthur and Merlin 
— Ethelred — Paulinus — Alfred — Coleridge's estimate of his cha- 
racter — Difficulty of discussing historical questions — Polemics — 
Dun Stan, an illustration — Sir Roger de Coverley — Saint Dunstan — 
Want of a poetic view of his character — The Danes — Canute the 
Great — Ballads — Edward the Confessor — Touching for the "king's 
evil" — Reference in Macbeth — The palace and the tombs of Eng- 
lish kings. 

In my last lecture I was engaged in considering that 
remote and uncertain period, during whicli the people of 
Britain dwelt apart from the rest of the known world — 
the purely legendary period of British history. In the 
fabulous chronicles of those ages there may, perhaps, be 
germs of truth; and, hereafter, historical science may 
bring to light more than our philosophy now dreams of. 

* January 4th, 1847. 
78 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 79 



Before I turn away from the antiquity, in whicli Britain 
was morally and intellectually, as well as physically, an 
island in a northern sea, let me briefly notice one legend 
which, like that of King ^ear, illustrates the simplicity 
of feeling belonging to such -periods, when the social and 
family relations have the same kind of importance, as the 
great political combinations have in ages more advanced. 
Having to find whatever of good there is amid the fables 
of the simple annals of the very olden time, I would fain 
persuade you that they have at least this merit — they 
show us human beings, it may be only fabulous men and 
women, but still beings with human hearts, actuated by 
the passions and motives of humanity; whereas, in many 
a stately history of more authentic times, you find names 
of real personages indeed, but only names, without a prin- 
ciple of life in them; so that they do, in truth, become 
utterly unreal to us, and might be, for all the sympathy 
we can have, another order of created beings, and history 
might be the story of another planet. This is one griev- 
ous want in all histories, except those of a rare and high 
order — the want of that one touch of nature that "makes 
the whole world kin.'^ National society is made to appear, 
not as if it were a community of thinking, sentient human 
beings, but like some vast and insensate machine swayed 
by the craft of courts, or urged by martial prowess. 
The chief part of what we know of the past is aggregate 
war; so that it has been said with lively truth, that 
" Many histories give you little else than a narrative of 
miUtary afiairs, marches and countermarches, skirmishes 
and battles ; which, except during some great crisis of a 
truly national war, affords about as complete a picture of 
a nation's life as an account of the doses of physic a man 



LECTURE THIRD. 



may have taken, and tlie surgical operations lie may have 
undergone, would of the life of an individual."* 

In the tragedy of King Lear we saw that the national 
history was identified with a simple story of parental 
anguish and filial ingratitude, alleviated by the blessed 
influences of the filial piety of one virtuous daughter. 
Another portion of that early history is a simple story 
of fraternal afiection, which gave to one of the ancient 
kings of Britain the title of the "pious EHdure." It is 
told how the good king Gorbonian reigned wisely and 
well — ^building temples to the gods, and giving to every 
man his due, and the people prospered; until, this just 
king dying, a son, unworthy of him, came to the throne 
— the tyrant Artegal. The impatient nobles and the 
vexed people drove him from his kingdom; and, while 
he was wandering in foreign lands, his brother Elidure is 
placed on the throne. After many wanderings, the exile 
came across the seas to live a hidden life in his native 
land, seeking there no more than water from the spring 
and the chance food an outlaw finds. The king, hunting 
in the forest of Calater, by chance meets his deposed and 
now humbled brother; and, in an instant, the prevailing 
power of fraternal love leaves no room for any lingering 
pride of royalty. The forlorn outcast is recognised by 
this gentle barbarian as not only his brother but his king; 
and, abased as he is by memory of his former years, and 
chastened by poverty and grief, he is bidden to take the 
sceptre again. Elidure intercedes for him with an of- 
fended nation; and, by such heroic afiection, he puts 
away from himself a kingdom to reinstate a repentant 



* Hare's Guesses at Truth. First Series, p. 358. 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 81 



brother. A modern poet has given the legend in lan- 
guage appropriately unadorned, and thus it closes : 

" The story tells what courses were pursued, 
Until King Elidure, with full consent 
Of all his peers, before the multitude, 
Rose, — and, to consummate this just intent, 
Did place upon his brother's head the crown, 

Relinquished by his own; 
Then to his people cried, * Receive your lord, 
Grorbonian's first-born son, your rightful king restored l' 
The people answered with a loud acclaim : 
Yet more ; — heart-smitten by the heroic deed, 
The reinstated Artegal became 
Earth's noblest penitent ; from bondage freed 
Of vice, — thenceforth unable to subvert 

Or shake his high desert. 
Long did he reign; and when he died, the tear 
Of universal grief bedewed his honoured bier. — 

Thus was a brother by a brother saved ; 
With whom a crown (temptation that hath set 
Discord in hearts of men, till they have braved 
Their nearest kin with deadly purpose met) 
'Gainst duty weighed, and faithful love, did seem 

A thing of no esteem ; 
And, from this triumph of aflfection pure. 
He bore the lasting name of 'pious Elidure.' "* 

The legend of Artegal and Elidure, like that of King 
Lear, belongs to those times in which Britain was, at 
least as far as authentic history informs us, in its insular 
solitude. I proceed now to a period when there was 
intercourse between Britain and the South. It is in the 
early part of those times that Shakspeare has laid the 
scene of the play of " Cymbeline,^' in which we find him 

* Wordsworth's Artegal and Elidure. Works, p. 93 



LECTURE THIRD. 



transporting his characters from London to Rome, with a 
violation of one of the dramatic unities that shocks the 
French critics, and with a speed that outstrips even 
modern locomotion. The play affords very little histori- 
cal illustration ; which, indeed, we can hardly expect to 
find until, as I have said, we come to the period of the 
proper ^^ Chronicle-Plays/' 

I have had occasion to direct your attention to a fact 
which, though quite obvious, is apt, I think, to escape 
reflection unless especially noticed, — I mean the fact 
that our ancient history is confined, almost entirely, to 
the region of the shores of the Mediterranean Sea. I 
wish now to proceed with the further consideration of the 
breaking down of those limits, and the expansion of his- 
tory which is consequent on the intercommunion of the 
Mediterranean people with the nations of the North. 
They were kept apart until the time came when God's 
purposes in the providential government of the earth 
were to be fulfilled by blending them together. I say 
they were kept apart ^ and I mean, of course, by some- 
thing more than human power. No theory of mere 
secondary historic causes is adequate to explain the long- 
continued separation of the Northern and Southern na- 
tions of Europe ; and that there was a providence in it 
appears, too, from this, — that it is that very separation 
which has influenced the whole course of modern history, 
taking as it does so much of its character from the infu- 
sion of the fresh life of the people of the North. 

In the reading of history, our minds do not look upon 
the nations of Northern and Southern Europe relatively 
to each other. In the history of Greece or of Rome, the 
occasional introduction of some Northern race is an epi- 



THE llOMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 83 



sode in the story of the Greeks and Romans, and it is 
nothing more. But my present subject draws us to the 
general view of those nations as they stood in relation one 
to the other — the North to the South — for many long 
ages isolated, and then thrown into national communion 
of a certain kind. A great barrier divided them; and 
that it was to endure for a certain period of the world as 
an effectual separation, appears from this, — that the 
power on neither side was able prematurely to break it 
down. The North could not conquer the South on the 
soil of the South, nor could the South conquer the North 
on Northern ground. There was mutual strength for 
independence and mutual weakness for conquest. In 
God's good season, the great partition wall crumbled and 
fell as if by ^Hhe unimaginable touch of Time;'^ while, 
before that period, no power of the hosts of men had pre- 
vailed against it.* 

If you look at the map of Europe, you cannot fail to 
observe, in connection with this subject, how much there 
is in geographical character that served at once to hem 
in the nations of the South, and hinder them and the 
nations of the North from reciprocal conquest. Between 
the western coast of the Euxine Sea and the Atlantic 
Ocean, there runs east and west a great mountain range, 
which, beginning with the chain of Mount Haemus to 
the north of Macedon, continues westward with the Al- 
pine range, and ends with the Pyrenees, thus forming a 
vast natural rampart to Greece, Italy, and Spain, — the 
regions of the Mediterranean. When they of the South 

* " The unimaginable touch of Time." Wordsworth's Sonnet on 
Mutability, p. 368.. 



84 LECTURE THIRD. 



crossed tins barrier in tlie search of new homes^ their 
progress was arrested by other natural boundaries; for 
they stopped on the borders of the great rivers of central 
Europe. The great North was still a vast and unknown 
domain; for it has been well said that — "The Eoman 
colonies, along the banks of the Rhine and the Danube, 
looked out on the country beyond those rivers as we 
look up to the stars, and see with our eyes a world of 
which we actually know nothing. The Eomans knew 
that there was a vast portion of earth which they did 
not know; how vast it might be was a part of its 
mysteries.^^* 

But that the Northern and Southern nations were 
providentially kept distinct is, to my mind, still moro 
apparent by the whole tenor of ancient history; for, 
whenever these two races came in contact, or rather in 
conflict, there is something that looks like a vain and 
impious strife against a Divine decree. It is not the 
story of an ordinary invasion and repulse : it is something 
more — a dim intimation of more than human agency — 
the awfulness of Divine interposition making it manifest 
that there were great providential purposes, and that a 
signal retribution was to fall on every attempt to frus- 
trate them. It is like a religious service, in which the 
rites of paganism assume a peculiar and unwonted so- 
lemnity. 

Observe how it was when the Northern nations first 
came into connection with the civilized world in the 
fourth century before the birth of our Saviour. The 
Celts or Gauls came down by tens of thousands upon 

* Arnold's Lectures on Modern History, Am. ed., p. 47. 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 85 



the plains of Italy^ and swept onward in savage and 
sanguinary triumph, to the gates of Rome. Of the routed 
and slaughtered Roman army only a few fugitives had 
escaped. In dismay, the city was well-nigh abandoned ; 
for the great mass of the CommonSj with their wives and 
children, fled to other towns. The holy things of Roman 
worship were removed or buried. What could be more 
hopeless ? But the young Patricians resolved to defend the 
citadel — that which was the sanctuary of the nation — the 
most sacred spot, the safety of which seemed to secure 
their national existence, though the rest of the city were 
given up to foreign pillage. The aged Senators, who could 
serve their country only by their deaths, assembled, clad 
in their most solemn vestments and in their triumphal 
robes; and, repeating the words after the high-priest for 
the redemption of their country, they devoted themselves, 
and the army of the Gauls with themselves, to the spirits 
of the dead and the Earth, the common grave of the 
living. It is a very familiar part of Roman story how 
they awaited in their curule chairs, in calm and awful 
silence, the approach of their destroyers, and how the 
fierce barbarians were, for a moment, awed by the sight. 
One of the soldiers stroked the long white beard of Mar- 
cus Papirius ; but the old man, who had been a minister 
of the gods, was outraged by the touch of profane barba- 
rian hands, and smote the Gaul with his ivory sceptre. 
The blow was the signal for unsparing slaughter; — they 
perished, but pestilence soon swept the invader from the 
land. I refer to such familiar events, because they are so 
plainly significant of the mutual repulsion of these races, 
and they show that hundreds of years were still to pass 
before the Gaul and the Roman could dwell together. 



LECTURE THIRD. 



Again, wherij in the third century, the North sought 
by conquest communion with the South, more than two 
hundred thousand of the G-auis broke through the fron- 
tiers of Macedon; and there occurred that sublime pas- 
sage in Greek history when the Northern barbarians, like 
the Persians of yore, sought the plunder of the magnifi- 
cent temple of the Delphic Apollo — the centre of all the 
religious emotions of Grecian idolatry. The immense 
host of the invader fled in confusion when the sanctuaiy, 
with all its accumulated treasures, was almost in their 
power for pillage; and the legend tells how the spirit of 
Apollo fell on them to bewilder and destroy. Amid the 
earthquake and the tempest, which came in that won- 
drous hour of battle, the priests rushed forth exclaiming 
that they had seen the god pass across the vault of the 
temple, and that they had heard the whistling of the 
arrows and the clanging of the lances of the armed 
deities of Greece. When the morrow's sun arose, the 
huge bulk of many a Northern warrior lay buried 
beneath the rocks of Delphi, while the survivors were 
fleeing away in panic from the sunny regions of the 
South. This showed that the Gaul and the Greek were 
not to dwell together.'^ 

Once more, when, in the first century before the Chris- 
tian era, the great Cimbric and Teutonic invasion of Italy 
was driven back by the stern Plebeian soldier, Caius 3Ia- 
rius, nothing resulted in the way of permanent subjuga- 
tion. It was simply invasion and repulse, as if some 
huge wave had rushed in, and, after doing its work of 
partial devastation, had rolled back again into its cus- 

* B. C. 279. Smith's History of Greece, (Felton,) p. 528. 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 



tomary channel. When the tide of invading conquest set 
in a different direction, and pressed upon the regions of 
the North, it soon, in like manner, found its limit. The 
legions of the first Roman emperor penetrated into the 
forests of Grermany, but they penetrated to perish there. 
The soldiers of the South had crossed the borders of what 
seemed to be forbidden ground even to the victorious pro- 
gress of Roman conquest, and the penalty was defeat and 
extermination. A nation rose, — mighty Germany — 

"She of the Danube and of the Northern Sea;"* 

and the great victory achieved by Hermann and his Teu- 
tonic soldiers was naught less than the total sacrifice of 
the Roman intruders. The palace of the Caesars echoed 
with the imperial lamentations for the lost legions; and 
when, some years afterwards, Germanicus, with another 
Roman army, followed in the footsteps of Yarns, never 
did Roman pride receive a sterner or more impressive re- 
buke than when, amid the silence and gloom of the forest 
of Teutoburg, they reached a spot where, for the first 
time, the fate of Varus and his legions was legible in the 
rusting fragments of Roman weapons, and the more awful 
characters of the bleaching bones of their slaughtered 
countrymen. "I* In commemoration of the achievement 
of the hero of the first war of German independence, a 
colossal statue of Hermann has been constructed, within, 
I believe, the last ten or fifteen years, upon the spot which 

* Wordsworth's Sonnet, "A Prophecy," p. 258. 

f Tacitus, Ann. i. 61, 62. Suetonius thus records imperial sorrow 
*' Adeo denique consternatura ferunt, ut, per continues menses barba 
capilloque submisso, caput interdum foribus illideret, vociferana 
* Quintili Vare, legiones redde !' " Augustus, c. 23. W. B. R. 



LECTURE THIRD. 



has been classic in the national mind of Germany in all 
later ages. If, in such a tribute paid by filial piety after 
a lapse of eighteen hundred years, we may, on the one 
hand, see something rather grotesquely characteristic of 
German deliberation, we may also find in it a proof of the 
awakening sense of reverence for ancient times in the 
heart of this nineteenth century. It seems to me, let me 
add, one of the healthful symptoms of a better spirit of 
the times, that a people should now deem it not too late 
to commemorate an heroic act of eighteen hundred years 
ago : it is a change from that rash and revolutionary 
temper which was of late so rife — ^which looked upon the 
olden time with disdain, and with that insolence of self- 
sufficiency which vaunts, that 

" Of old things, all are over old : 
Of good things, none are good enough : 
We'll show that we can help to frame 
A world of other stuff."* 

It is this victory of Hermann over the Romans that 
Arnold refers to when, during a tour in Germany, he 
says : — ^^ Far before us lay the land of our Saxon and 
Teutonic forefathers — the land uncorrupted by Roman or 
any other mixture — the birthplace of the most moral 
races of men that the world has yet seen — of the soundest 
laws, the least violent passions, and the fairest domestic 
and civil virtues. I thought of that memorable defeat of 
Varus and his three legions, which forever confined the 

* Wordsworth's ''Rob Roy's Grave," p. 243. ''It is something to 
see reviving that filial feeling towards the years which begot us, which 
delightii to own gratitude for the benefits received from them, and to 
deal reverently even with their faults, rather than to insult them by a 
perpetual boast of our own superiority." Quarterly Review, 1841. 
Vol Ixix. p. 113. ^^.B. R. 



THE KOMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 



Romans to tlie western side of the Rhine^ and preserved 
tte Teutonic nation — ^tte regenerating element in modern 
Europe — safe and free/^* It was this battle, and tlie 
defeat of the Moors by Charles Martel, that Arnold used 
to rank as the two most important battles in the world. 
The victory in the forest of Teutoburg saved G-ermany 
from Roman subjugation, as the battle of Tours stayed the 
course of Saracenic aggression upon Western Christen- 
dom, preserving European civilization from Asiatic con- 
quest, as, in ancient times, the victory of Marathon — 
another of the critical battles in the world's history — had 
saved Greece from Persian power. ■j' 



* Life and Correspondence. App. C. p. 454. 

f The idea of a series of critical or decisive battles in the world's 
history, originating, perhaps, in an incidental remark of Mr. Hallam, 
has been cleverly elaborated in a work with this title by Professor 
Creasy, of University College, London; and I am glad of the occa- 
sion, valueless as my testimony may be, to bear it not only to tho 
attractiveness, but the value of these volumes. The series extend 
from Marathon to Waterloo, with, as it seems to me, but one material 
omission, — for Mr. Creasy's view extends to this side of the Atlantic, 
— the battle on the Plains of Abraham, in 1759, by which the French 
Colonial America was destroyed, and North America became English 
beyond peradventure. Surely, this was a decisive battle. 

From this work, I am tempted to make an extract illustrative ot 
what is alluded to in the text, — the memorial of Arminius's victory. — 
"Nearly eighteen centuries after the death of Arminius, the modern 
Germans conceived the idea of rendering tardy homage to their great 
hero ; and, accordingly, some eight or ten years ago, a general sub- 
scription was organized in Germany, for the purpose of erecting, on 
the Osning, (a conical mountain, which forms the highest summit of 
the Teutoburger "Wald, and is eighteen hundred feet above the level 
of the sea,) a colossal bronze statue of Arminius. The statue was de- 
signed by Bandel. The hero was to stand, uplifting a sword in his 
right hand, and looking towards the Rhine, The height of the statue 



90 LECTURE THIRD. 



Now the general historical view whicli I wish to im- 
press on your minds is this — that the nations of Northern 
and Southern Europe were providentially kept apart until 
a period when intercourse should produce very different 
results from what would have followed had they come 
together sooner. When the people of the North came 
into continued contact with the E-omans, the Roman 
Empire — the fourth empire — ^had completed the mighty 
work which was assigned to it in the providential govern- 
ment of the earth. The office of the Koman Empire 
among nations, according to the well-known prophetical 
description in the book of Daniel, was to 'devour/' to 
^Hread down/' to "break in pieces/' and wonderfully did 
Rome fulfil her function; for, from the primal gathering 
upon the Palatine Hill, she went right onward for eight 
centuries, on a career of conquest as straight as her own 
great roads — the Emilian or the Appian highway. That 
whicb was tjrpified in the prophet's vision as the fourth 
beast, "dreadful and terrible and strong exceedingly," — 
the iron power of Rome, — achieved the work assigned 

"was to be eighty feet from the base to the point of the sword, and was 
to stand on a circular Gothic temple, ninety feet high, and supported 
by oak-treet' as columns. The mountain, where it was to be erected, 
is wild and stern, and overlooks the scene of the battle. It was cal- 
culated that the statue would be clearly visible at a distance of sixty 
miles. The temple is nearly finished, and the statue itself has been 
cast at the copper-works of Lemago. But there, through want of 
funds to set it up, it has lain for some years, in disjointed fragments, 
exposed to the mutilating homage of relic-seeking travellers. The 
idea of honouring a hero who belongs to all Germany, is not one which 
the present rulers of that divided country have any wish to encou- 
rage; and tne statue may long continue to lie there, and present too 
vrue a type of the condition of Germany herself." Creasy's Fifteen 
Decisive BaivJcs of the World, vol. i. p. 250. 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 



to it, by conquering the tribes and islands and -n-ations, 
and absorbing tbeni in ber own vast unity — ^by con- 
verting an ancient dynasty like Egypt into a Koman 
province — or sweeping away the last remnant of Grreek 
freedom and the fragments of tbe Macedonian Empire— 
or by annihilating a commercial realm like Carthage with 
its colonies. 

Bringing this to bear immediately on my subject, 
Britain, too, came within the scope of Eome's destiny; 
for Roman waffere was carried there and Roman power 
established. But it was slow and feeble and imperfect 
conquest, as in the evening of a well-fought day, when the 
soldier fights faintly or is sinking down to sleep on his 
field of battle — or in old age, when the veteran's arm is 
not so strong nor his passions so fierce. The conquest of 
Britain seems to me very difierent from the early con- 
quests made by Rome; it was not such subjugation as 
destroys the elements of nationality. The whole power 
did not pass into the hands of the Romans, but was 
shared by victors and vanquished. 

The Roman supremacy was established, and the inde- 
pendence of the Britons was destroyed, except in the west 
of the island, where the mountains of Wales gave a home 
to British freedom ; still, the conquest was not of such a 
nature as either to sweep the original inhabitants from 
the land, or to reduce them to abject servitude. It was 
certainly conquest, and, doubtless, accompanied with 
much of the misery of conquest; but it partook also 
of the nature of alliance, or what may be intimated by 
a term which has become familiar of late to our ears — a 
kind of annexation. The Britons were Romanized, but 
they did not cease to be the British people. It was not 



92 LECTURE THIRD. 



a revolution utterly destructive of national character or 
of religious and political institutions. Tlie conquered 
race seemed to be more benefited than tbe conquerors. 
During the early period of Roman warfare in Britain, tbe 
evils of foreign invasion were cruelly inflicted; and we can 
easily credit tbe story of Boadicea — the slaugbter of tbe 
Druids — tbe captivity of Caractacus, and the forced exile 
of many from tbeir homes to make room for the soldiers 
of the Eoman legions. But when the fierceness of the 
war was over, the Eoman and the Briton dwelt together; 
and, while Roman law was introduced, much of subordi- 
nate authority was preserved in the hands of British 
rulers. Under the Roman Empire there were British 
kings, and thus the royal title was perpetuated in an 
imperial province. To anticipate a term of the feudal 
system, Britain was a kind of vassal nation of the Roman 
Empire ; and, while it kept its own national identity, it 
received and appropriated to itself much that was benefi- 
cial in Roman government. Tacitus is referred to as ex- 
pressing surprise, if not indignation, at the facility and 
eagerness with which the Britons adopted the customs, 
the artS; the garb, and the refinement of their conquerors.* 
In the play of Cymbeline, Shakspeare has portrayed 
the two nations in such a relation as that which I have 
been endeavouring to present to your minds. He is care- 
ful to preserve a certain degree of British independence, 
while Roman influence or supremacy is also recognised ; 
and, with regard to national character, he shows, in the 
Italian villain of the play, how thoroughly demoralized 
the Roman people had become — how much they had lost 

* Tacitus, Tit. Agricolee, c. xvi. 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 93 



of the high and heroic part of their nature in the low and 
irreligious sensuality of Epicurean philosophy.* On the 
other hand^ the poet has shown, in the Britons of the 
play, the good and the evil which appertain to an im- 
perfect condition of civilization. He has elevated our 
thoughts of ancient Britain by adorning it with the 
character of Imogen — one of the loveliest of that match- 
less company of women who have their life and being in 
the drama of Shakspeare; and in the wild heroism of 
her two brothers, — the stolen sons of Cymbeline, — ^he has 
shown, what has been truly said, that — ^'When a rude 
people have lost somewhat of their ferocity, and have not 
yet acquired the vices of a later stage of civilization, 
their character really exhibits much that is noble and 
excellent; and, both in its good and bad points, it so 
captivates the imagination, that it has always been re- 
garded by the writers of a more advanced state of society 
with an admiration even beyond its merits.^^ 

In the imperfect state of historical knowledge respect- 
ing the early period of British history, we are apt, I 
think, to form a false conception of the civilization of the 
Britons. Receiving the first impression of their rude 
barbarism, we not only trust the description too much, 
but we carry it too far, in their history; and, accord- 
ingly, the common notion of the ancient Briton is, that 
they were savages who sacrificed human victims, and 
painted their skins. The truth as to the condition of 

■*■ It was upon the trial of the queen that Mr. Brougham, speaking 
of the perjured Italian witness, quoted lachimo's words : 
" I have belied a lady. 
The princess of the country ; and the air on't 
Revengingly enfeebles me." W. B. R. 



94 LECTURE THIRD. 



Britain appears to be, that it was a favoured and flourish- 
ing portion of the Eoman Empire. A very considerable 
number of large cities, and a greater number of towns, 
are known by name as haying flourished in various parts 
of the country. The Romans brought with them their 
luxuries, arts, and sciences; and, accordingly, temples 
and theatres and towns, baths and porticos, gates, 
triumphal arches, and market-places arose, remarkable 
for their architecture and decorated with sculpture and 
statuary. Such was the reputation of the Romanized 
British architects, that they were sent by Constantius into 
Gaul to rebuild a ruined city. It has been said, with no 
less vividness than accuracy, that what Calcutta is now 
to London, London or York was to Rome. For four 
hundred years was the Roman influence at work in a 
large part of Britain; and that influence produced its 
results, not only in the arts as displayed in public and 
private edifices, but also in the more permanent political 
efibcts resulting from the establishment of the municipal 
rights and privileges of the towns. 

Visible proofs of the condition of Britain during the 
Roman period are not unfrequently found at the present 
day, when some excavation discloses a tesselated pave- 
ment, or a buried arch, or military road, or when Roman 
coins are dug up, or sacrificial vessels, or ancient imple- 
ments of war or peace. There are standing the more 
manifest ruins of the frontier walls — the extended lines 
of fortifications by which Britain was defended against 
the Caledonian — chiefly the wall of Severus, the height 
of which, in one part of its ruins, was curiously ascer- 
tained by that fervid antiquarian, Ritson. On a visit to 
Sir Walter Scott, Ritson, who was by nature very prone 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 95 



to controversy, and, with all his learning, perhaps a little 
insane, disputed the existence of any ruins of the wall, 
trusting to some information that had been given him. 
Scott assured him where the ruin was to be seen, and 
added that it was high enough to break the neck of Mr. 
Ritson's inaccurate informer were he to fall from it. 
This strong and natural expression, irritating Ritson's 
fiery zeal for accuracy, was carefully noted by him ; and 
Scott was soon after astonished at finding how literally 
his uncalculating phrase had been taken; for a letter 
from Ritson stated that he had indeed found the ruin, 
which he had visited for the very purpose of jumping 
down from the wall to test the fidelity of Sir Walter's 
description, which his escape with an unbroken neck 
proved to be hyperbolical. He adds, however, that the 
height of the wall was such as to make the experiment 
dangerous; and I repeat the anecdote to give you an 
impression as to the state of those famous Roman ruins. 
So little is preserved of the national relics of the Roman- 
British times, and so little can be distinctly traced in the 
permanent influence of social or political institutions of 
that period, that there arises, what appears to me, another 
erroneous historical view of those distant eras. Knowing 
scarce any thing of the primitive British period, we are 
apt to conclude that the Britons became extinct or were 
pushed from their land, as the Indians in our own coun- 
tiy are thrust away by the white population ; and that, 
therefore, they transmitted to succeeding generations no 
influence or national character. In like manner, thouo-h 
in less degree, we are apt to fancy, because our informa- 
tion is imperfect, that the Roman era of British history 
left but few traces behind it ; and hence we hastily con- 



LECTURE THIRD. 



elude, that modern Englisli and American character is 
derived only from the later elements of the Anglo-Saxon 
and Norman eras. Such a view is hardly rational, when 
we reflect that the Britojis occupied the island from an 
unknown antiquity — that they never were driven from it, 
but were amalgamated with their Roman conquerors — 
and that Roman civilization abode there for four hun- 
dred years. The periods were of such duration, and the 
circumstances were such, that the influence could not 
have stopped abruptly as the periods respectively closed. 
It appears to me more reasonable and truthful, and certainly 
it raises the dignity of our race, to take such a view as 
preserves the continuity of the history, and to regard the 
successive periods as revolutions not destructive or over- 
whelming, but modifying ancient things by the introduc- 
tion of new elements. The Britons underwent a Roman 
change, and then came, as we shall presently see, a Saxon 
change, and then a Norman change ; and, from the suc- 
cessive influences of them all, there came forth a great 
— ^the greatest modern nation. The revolutions were not 
sudden, devastating, volcanic eruptions, leaving nothing 
but barren ashes and indurated lava, but rather may they 
be compared to a series of geological formations strewn in 
due and solid succession. 

Before passing from the Roman period, I can do no 
more than advert to the early introduction of Chris- 
tianity into Britain j and whether or no the gospel was 
first preached there by St. Paul or St. Peter, and 
whether or no the first Christian church was humbly 
and rudely built by Joseph of Arimathea, Druidical 
paganism passed quickly away. The remote and insular 
situation of the British Christians did not shelter them 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 97 



from the perils which were the trials of faith in its early 
era. It was in the tenth and last of the great persecu- 
tions, when, according to a vivid poetic phrase, 

"Diocletian's fiery sword 
Worked busy as the lightning/'* 

that Alban, the first of Britain's martyrs, gave up his 
earthly life. English chivalry has also exulted, that the 
first Christian king and the first Christian emperor were 
natives of Britain. 

The great providential agency of Rome in the history 
of the world was now drawing to an end — the empire 
was near its death — the last of the legions was withdrawn 
from Britain, and the emperor bade the Britons provide 
for their own defence. They were left with Roman arts 
and arms and civilization ; hut the heart of the people 
was faint, and they were helpless in the simple necessity 
of self-defence. From their island home they piteously 
entreated once more for the protection of Roman supre- 
macy, exclaiming — " The barbarians drive us to the sea, 
and the sea drives us back to the barbarians.' ^f Help 
could not come from Rome, whose expiring strength was 
sinking before the hosts of the Groth, the Vandal, and 
the Hun. I need not stop to say how the Britons were 
saved from the Pictish and Scottish invasions only by the 
fierce alliance of the Saxons. The country was given 
over again to victorious invasion and the settlement of a 
race of Northern heathens. Nor need I dwell on the 
introduction of a new national element, which, though it 

* "Diocletian's fiery sword," &c. Wordsworth's Sonnet on Perse^ 
cution, p. 349. 

f Milton's History of Britain, p. 125. 

7 



LECTURE THIED. 



brought misery witli it, contained tlie germs of so mucli 
that was precious in the after-history of the land. The 
Saxon dominion was planted in a soil wet with blood; 
and it is in this ineffectual war, that early romance has 
placed the fabled exploits of Arthur and his peers, and 
the conjurations and sorcery of Merlin. The ruins of 
that gigantic and mysterious structure, Stonehenge, 
which, at this day, stands in awful silence upon Salis- 
bury Plain, is supposed to be the monument of the 
treacherous massacre of three hundred British nobles 
by their Saxon foes.* Christian Britain was paganized 
again, and the faith again endured the fiery ordeal of 
heathen persecution. When Ethelred, the Saxon king 
of Northumberland, invaded Wales, and was about to 
give battle to the Britons, he perceived close by the 
enemy a host of unarmed men. He asked who they 
were and what they were doing, and was told they were 
the monks of Bangor, praying for the success of their 
countrymen. ^'Then,'' said Ethelred, and he said 
rightly, " they are fighting against us.'' The word went 
forth to attack them first ; and twelve hundred of those 



* I am not as much in the habit of quoting "Wordsworth as my 
brother was, not being so familiar with his poems, and, perhaps, (this 
I say with diflSdence,) relatively, not so appreciative of their merits ; 
but his lines on Stonehenge (Excursion, b. iii.) are very grand. The 
parenthetical idea is magnificent : 

"Not less than that huge Pile (from some abyss 
Of mortal power unquestionably sprung,) 
Whose hoary Diadem of pendant rocks 
Confines the shrill-voiced whirlwind, round and round 
Eddying within its vast circumference, 
On Sarum's naked plain." W. B. R 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 99 



unarmed Christian men perished by a bloody death. 
But fierce as was this persecution, when the Heptarchy 
was established, the wild superstition of the Saxons was 
brought under the sway of Christianity, chiefly by the 
mission of St. Augustine. When Paulinus visited the 
court of King Edwin, the king convened a council to 
determine whether their heathen creed should bow to the 
tidings which Paulinus brought; and it was there a 
pagan counsellor gave utterance to that beautiful imagi- 
native argument, which, told by the old Saxon historian, 
has been thus rendered in modern verse : 

"Man's life is like a Sparrow, miglity King ! 
That, stealing in, while by the fire you sit 
Housed with rejoicing Friends, is seen to flit 
Safe from the storm, in comfort tarrying. 
Here did it enter — there on hasty wing 
Flies out, and passes on from cold to cold; 
But whence it came we know not, nor behold 
"Whither it goes. Even such that transient Thing 
The human Soul : not utterly unknown 
While in the Body lodged, her warm abode ; 
But from what world She came, what woe or weal 
On her departure waits, no tongue hath shewn ; 
This mystery if the Stranger can reveal, 
His be a welcome cordially bestowed !"* 

The growth of the English Christian Commonwealth 
advanced with due progress in those Saxon centuries, 
and at length we read, in the ninth century, of the 
saintly and heroic reign of Alfred — the soldier and the 
lawgiver — who has left a name which, like one, and 
perhaps only one, other, stands on the page of history 

•=• Wordsworth's Ecclesiastical Sonnets. 



100 LECTURE THIRD. 



purely irreproachable^ honoured, and faultless. I should, 
perhaps, run into mere common-places were I to attempt 
to say more respecting this famous Saxon sovereign; and 
I prefer, therefore, borrowing the words of Coleridge in 
his lecture on the character of the Gothic mind in the 
Middle Ages : 

^' I must now turn to our great monarch, Alfred — one 
of the most august characters that any age has ever pro- 
duced; and when I picture him, after the toils of govern- 
ment and dangers of battle, seated by a solitary lamp, 
translating the Holy Scriptures into the Saxon tongue — 
when I reflect on his moderation in success, on his forti- 
tude and perseverance in difficulty and defeat, and on the 
wisdom and extensive nature of his legislation, I am 
really at a loss which part of this great man's character 
most to admire. Yet, above all, I see the grandeur, the 
freedom, the mildness, the domestic unity, the universal 
character of the Middle Ages condensed into Alfred's 
glorious institution of the trial by jury. I gaze upon it 
as the immortal symbol of that age, — an age called, 
indeed, dark, — but how could that age be considered 
dark which solved the difficult problem of universal 
liberty, freed man from the shackles of tyranny, and 
subjected his actions to the decision of twelve of his 
fellow-countrymen ?"* 

In his fragment on English history, Burke has said 
that Alfred's piety — which, with all its zeal and fervour, 
was of an enlarged and noble kind — was the principle 
that supported him in so many fatigues, and fed like an 
abundant source his civil and military virtues. It has 

^ Coleridge's Literary Remains, vol. i. p. 74. Ed. 1836, Pickevin/;. 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 101 



been shown^ as conclusive proof of the unfairness and tlie 
infidel tendency of Hume's history, that in it every fact 
is studiously concealed that would have displayed the 
governing principle of Alfred's life to have been an active 
belief in Christianity.* 

From the obscurity which hangs over the Anglo-Saxon 
period, there shine forth, though with somewhat of 
mysterious dimness, four great names, which, in their 
several ways, characterize and illustrate the times. The 
earliest and most glorious of these is that which I have 
just noticed, King Alfred; the others are Dunstan, 
Canute, and Edward the Confessor. In proceeding to a 
brief notice of the second of these characters, I find 
myself approaching the neighbourhood of those questions 
which have been discussed with more of ecclesiastical 
animosity than historical candour; and it is difficult to 
speak of even so remote a personage as St. Dunstan, 
without, perhaps, touching the morbidly sensitive nerve 
of some prejudice or prepossession belonging to later 
periods. I have no desire to seek topics of this descrip- 
tion; and, on the other hand, entertaining no opinions 
which I need hold in reserve, and being, unless I greatly 
deceive myself, incapable of saying any thing that would 
wound the reasonable feelings of anybody, it would be 
unjust, both to you and myself, were I timidly to avoid 
such questions when they come directly in my way. 
They must lie in the path of any one who proposes to 
examine, however superficially, the period of history 
which forms our subject. During the Middle Ages, and 



* Quarterly Review, — "Hume and his Influence on History," — 
No. 146, March, 1844, pp. 577-579. W. B. R. 



102 LECTURE THIRD. 



even in modern times, for at least a century or more after 
tlie Reformation, you cannot, unless by a violent and 
irrational disruption, separate political and ecclesiastical 
history. The student of history desires to be instructed 
in forming a just estimate of the character of Dunstan, 
and he naturally supposes that such a subject can be can- 
didly and satisfactorily examined ; for he never dreams 
of writers getting angry about a man who lived nine hun- 
dred years ago. But to this day it is a vexed question 
with all the extreme contrarieties of eulogy and vitupera- 
tion, and it is far easier to go to either extreme than to 
find the truth. Party animosity is a grievous evil any- 
where, but nowhere more so than in historical investi- 
gation; and when I see how the candid inquiry after 
truth is perplexed and thwarted by it, I am reminded of 
that incident in the boyhood of Sir Roger de Coverley, 
which is told in one of those inimitable papers of the 
Spectator, of which he is the hero, and which abounds in 
such genuine English humour. ^' It happened to him,'' 
says the Spectator, "when he was a school-boy, which 
was at the time the feuds ran high between the Cavaliers 
and the Roundheads. Sir Roger, being then a stripling, 
had occasion to inquire which was the way to St. Anne's 
Lane ; upon which the person whom he spoke to, instead 
of answering him, called him a young popish cur, and 
asked him, who had made Anne a saint. The boy, being 
in some confusion, inquired of the next he met, which 
was the way to Anne's Lane, but was called a prick-eared 
cur for his pains; and, instead of being shown the way, 
was told that she had been a saint before he was born, 
and would be one after he was hanged. Upon this, says 
the knight, I did not think fit to repeat the former 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 103 



question; but, going into every lane of the neighbour- 
bood, asked wbat tbey called the name of that lane, — ^by 
wbicb ingenious artifice be found out tbe place be in- 
quired after witbout giving offence to any party."* 

Tbere is, I fear, no sucb ingenious artifice to belp one 
in threading tbe avenues of bistory. I am tempted to 
add anotber illustration of tbe difficulty of discerning 
bistoric trutb tbrougb tbe medium of party passion, 
wbicb is given by Sir Francis Palgrave, tbe incident 
baving occurred a few years ago in Dublin : 

"A pleasure-boat, belonging to a party of Bruns- 
wickers, baving been moored on tbe river Liffey, some 
of tbe bystanders on an adjoining quay were extremely 
incensed at tbe standard of defiance wbicb tbe vessel 
di^_:Uayed. Tbe vane at tbe mast-bead displayed an 
effigy — an Orangeman trampling on a green sbamrock. 
Tbis affront, aimed at tbe feelings of the multitude, was 
not to be borne. The Milesians attacked the hostile 
Saxon bark by hurling a furious volley of paving stones, 
and tbe unlucky crew, urged by danger or apprehension, 
discharged their firearms, and wounded some of the sur- 
rounding assemblage. A great commotion was excited, 
and tbe leaders of the belligerent parties were conducted 
to the police-office. Among tbe witnesses who were 
called was tbe tinman who had made the vane ; and this 
worthy tradesman gave tbe most candid and unequivocal 
testimony in full proof of the pacific intention of the 
pleasure-boat, though certainly somewhat to his own 
discredit as an artist. The unlucky cause of so much 
dissension and bloodshed, — the supposed Orangeman 

* Spectator, No. 125. 



104 LECTURE TniRD. 



trampling on the green shamrock, — was, in truth^ a 
flesh-coloured Mercury springing from a blue cloud.'^* 

So it is in history ; what is blue to one man's eye is 
green to another ; and often, what is seen by one as the 
spotless purity of white, looks black and begrimed to 
another. Tor the lecturer who, in his limited time, must 
glance rapidly over his subjects without stopping cau- 
tiously to qualify his expressions, — for him I fear there is 
a special danger of his flying Mercuries being mistaken 
for something or other quite different. 

But to return to St. Dunstan. I give him his title, 
notwithstanding the admonition of Sir Roger de Coverley's 
experience; for he stands, not only on the Romish Ca- 
lendar, but his name is retained on the Calendar of the 
Anglo-Catholic Church.f Noble by birth, the young 

* Palgrave's History of England. Preface, vol. i. p. xxxii. 

f At a time when the merest justice to the Roman Catholic Church 
is hazardous, I will presume to deprecate the use of this word 
"Romish," which, kindred to the other nicknames, "Romanist" and 
"Papist," ought to be banished from the language of Christian 
scholars and gentlemen. They are words of offence and disrespect, 
and therefore unfit for use except as part of the Billingsgate of 
controversy. They are undescriptive and unsanctioned by author- 
ity. In speaking to a Roman Catholic, common courtesy forbids 
the use of such words. In speaking of him, surely, among scholars, 
the same rule of courtesy should prevail. My brother — a most reso- 
lute Protestant — was singularly free from sectarian animosities, and 
this slip of language was, I am satisfied, purely accidental. On the 
next page but one he avoids the epithet. The following words, written 
in confidence years before these lectures, describe his feelings and 
opinions to the last hour of his life, — and yet it suited vulgar and 
ignorant men for their own poor purposes to describe Henry Reed as 
an ultraist in church matters. I wish I could be sure that their eyes 
— those, I mean, who did him, on more than one occasion, practical 
injustice — would read his truthful, almost eloquent, words : 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 105 



Saxon Thane exchanged liis rank for the austerities of 
monastic life. A commanding intellect and an indomita- 
ble spirit^ rare accomplishments, and a skill in the arts 
which excited the wonder and the awe of the people, 
form the character and attainments of this remarkable 
personage as described by all historians. But, beyond 
this, all is conflict and confusion of opinion, from which 
it is almost hopeless to attempt to draw a sure judgment. 
You find every variety of opinion, with no little uncer- 
tainty as to some of the facts whereon it is formed. 
Hume tells us that Dunstan's whole career was fraud 
and hypocrisy, — of course he tells you so, for that is 
his ^^ universal solvent" of all ecclesiastical questions.* 

" I cannot find in my heart," he writes, " any sympathy with 
that kind of church feeling which, when it finds the door in good 
condition, — hung on strong hinges and with a stout latch, — does not 
look with a thankful and affectionate spirit to the family within, as 
much as with somewhat of insolence and superciliousness to those who 
are without. It is, I apprehend, something of this kind which too 
often characterizes the self-styled — boastfully self-styled — High- 
Churchmanship : there is a certain temper about it which is odious to 
me, and at variance with what I trust and believe is the genuine 
heart of the church. It carries with it that unchurchlike self-obtru- 
sion which, extremes meeting, assimilates it to that which it professes 
its chief aversion to. The epithet "High," in this connection, is any 
thing but agreeable to my ears; and I am half-inclined to think that 
if it is important to 'unprotestantize the Reformation,' it may not be 
amiss to ' unhigJichurchmanize' the church. There is danger of what 
Julius Hare calls ' ecclesiolatry.' " MS. Letter, March 31, 1843. 

W. B. R. 

* This phrase, if I mistake not, will be found in a letter from Sir 
AValter Scott in Lockhart, in which he says that something "might 
be explained by the doctrine of the 'association of ideas,* or whatever 
other doctrine had taken the place of that which, in my day, had been 
the universal solvent of all metaphysical difficulties." W. B. R. 



106 LECTURE THIRD. 



Roman Catholic historical writers — Lingard and Charles 
Butler — uphold the probity and piety of St. Dunstan, 
and exhibit him as an ornament to his faith and his 
country. Southey denounces him as an arch miracle- 
monger, and as a complete exemplar of the monkish 
character in its worst form : he treats one of the alleged 
miracles as a piece of ventriloquism, and the other as a 
treacherous and most atrocious piece of wholesale murder. 
Milton, who had a hearty detestation of monastic charac- 
ter in every shape, must have been struck with admira^ 
fcion of the fearlessness with which Dunstan rebuked the 
vices of his king ; for he speaks of him as " a strenuous 
bishop, zealous without dread of persons, and, for aught 
that appears, the best of many ages.^^* Palgrave ex- 
plains part of Dunstan' s career by a theory of partial 
insanity, and another writer cautiously intimates he was 
neither so good nor so bad as he is made out. Sir James 
Mackintosh characterizes Dunstan as a zealous and, per- 
haps, useful reformer of religious instruction, of com- 
manding abilities, of a haughty, stern, and turbulent 
nature, without more personal ambition, perhaps, than is 
usually blended with public principle; and who, if he 
were proved guilty of some pious frauds, might not un- 
reasonably pray that a part of the burden of such guilt 
might be transferred from him to his age. 

Now, these are sorry materials to form an opinion out 
of, and I cannot but think how much better it would be 
if a Poet's charitable and catholic imagination had looked 
upon St. Dunstan's character, and left us a record of the 
vision. We should then, I believe, have been far better 

* Milton's History of Britain, p. 285. 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 107 



able to form a just conception of St. Dunstan's cliaracter 
and the powers of the mind which made him the leading 
and master-spirit of the Anglo-Saxon empire throughout 
many reigns — the Wolsey of his age.* We should have 
seen fanaticism or ambition, or perhaps sterner and fiercer 
elements, making the dark side of his character; and with 
this we should behold him a fearless reformer in the church, 
and a triumphant statesman in the kingdom. He arrayed 
himself against what he proclaimed to be the vices of the 
secular clergy, and all the energy of his indomitable spirit 
was exerted to establish the rule of the Benedictine order 
in the Saxon monasteries. Certain is it that he wielded 
a mighty power, for people and priests and kings trem- 
bled before him. As Primate of England and chief 
counsellor of the king, he is identified with the fame of 
that reign in which the Anglo-Saxon dominion had 
greater extent and majesty than it had known before — 
when ^^ Edgar the Peaceful" summoned the neighbour- 
ing sovereigns to bow before his supremacy, as Napoleon, 
at the height of his power, received at Dresden the ho- 
mage of subject monarchs. It was the result of Dunstan's 
administration that Edgar received the homage of eight 
British kings ; and, on one occasion, when he sat at the 
helm of his barge, each one of these royal vassals was 
plying an oar. Dunstan was in the councils of a reign 
when the Saxons breathed secure from the fierce inroads 
of the Danes. He was honoured and powerful by the 
side of a king who was thus lamented in what I may give 
you as a brief specimen of Saxon poetry : 

* Neither Henry Taylor, for Edwin the Fair had then appeared, 
nor "Wordsworth himself appear to have fulfilled my brother's wish as 
to the poetic illustration of Dunstan's character. W. B. R. 



108 LECTURE THIRD. 



^^Here ended Ms earthly joys^ Edgar^ England's king, 
and chose the light of another world, beauteous and 
happy. Here Edgar departed — the ruler of the Angles, 
the joy of the West Saxons, the defender of the Mer- 
cians — that was known afar among many nations. Kings 
beyond the baths of the sea-fowl worshipped him far and 
wide. They bowed to the king as one of their own kin. 
There was no fleet so proud, there was no host so strong, 
as to seek food in England while this noble king ruled 
the kingdom. He reared up Grod's honour — ^he loved 
Grod's law — he preserved the people's peace, the best of 
all the kings that were before in the memory of man. 
And God was his helper, and kings and earls bowed to 
him and they obeyed his will ; and, without battle, he 
ruled as he willed."* 

This happy reign ended, and the raven — the dark and 
dreaded emblem on the flag of the Danes — was again seen 
along the shores of England. For two hundred years 
were these fierce barbarians of the North the terror and 
the scourge of the Saxon; and ever when the Danish 
raven was seen above the waves that beat towards Eng- 
land, it was the sure omen of burning dwelling-houses, of 
pillaged monasteries, and of a fugitive or slaughtered 
people. And so the warfare was waged until at length, 
in the eleventh century, Saxon independence was given 
up to Canute — that mighty Scandinavian monarch who 
was at once King of Denmark and Sweden and Norway 
and England; and, with some claim to Scotland and 
Cambria, it was his boast that he ruled over six nations. 

*■ Translated from the Saxon Chronicle, pp. 116, 122,— in a note to 
Lingard, vol. i. p. 271. 



THE ROMAN AXD SAXON PERIODS. 109 



His reign appears to have been a splendid and a pros- 
perous one: lie was called ^'Canute the Giesit," and 
'' Canute the Kicli;'^ and, though he lived only a little 
beyond the age of forty, he was called ^^ Canute the 
Old;'^ for, in those turbulent times, the two-score years 
seem to have been regarded as an extraordinary duration 
for a king's life. It has been well said of him, that pros- 
perity softened but did not corrupt him ; and that he is 
one of the few conquerors whose greater and better quali- 
ties were developed in peace. A beautiful poetic light 
rests on the peaceful periods of his life : he was not only 
a conqueror and a lawgiver, but a royal minstrel; and 
there is still preserved from a ballad, which is said to 
have been long a favourite with the people of England, 
one stanza, which broke from him when, in his royal 
barge, he heard, over the waters of the river, the distant 
and solemn sound of the hymn that was chaunted in the 
minster of Ely.* There is that other beautiful and poetic 
story that is told of him, — so familiar that I need only 
allude to it, — that admirable piece of symbolical teaching 
so appropriate to his times, by which, on the sea-side, he 
won from the waves of the ocean a voice of rebuke to the 
flattery of his courtiers. The fitting sequel of that story 
is less familiar. It tells how — 

" Canute, (truth more -R-orthy to be known,) 
From that time forth, did for his brows disown 
The ostentatious symbol of a crown, — 

Esteeming earthly royalty 

Contemptible and vain."f 

* This stanza will be found in a note to Campbell's Essay on Eng- 
lish Poetry, p. 22. 

f Wordsworth's Canute and Alfred on the Sea-shore, p. 413. 



UO LECTURE THIRD. 



Wlien the Saxon dynasty was restored in tlie person 
of Edward, surnamed the Confessor, the meek and gentle 
piety of that saintly monarch was like a placid evening to 
close the Saxon day. But, looking away from the sove- 
reign's character, the political horizon of England was 
darkened by lowering clouds and a stormy sunset. The 
weapons with which Edward strove with his turbulent 
and tempestuous times were juridical wisdom and saintly 
piety. Feeble as he was in perpetuating Saxon inde- 
pendence, he was endeared to after times; and a high 
tribute was paid to his memory when, again and again, 
the nation demanded that there should be given back to 
them '^ the laws and customs of the good king Edward." 

It is only upon one historical point in English history that 
Shakspeare has touched in his tragedy of Macbeth, who 
was the Scottish contemporary of Edward the Confessor. 
There is a genuine poetic art in deepening the sense of 
the atrocities of Macbeth and the sufferings of Scotland 
under his usurpation and tyranny, by presenting the 
contrast of the Confessor's piety and virtues; and, most 
of all, the wondrous charity exerted by him on some of 
his subjects stricken by grievous malady. It was with 
Edward the Confessor that that remarkable practice 
began, of touching to cure the disease called the ^^ king's 
evil,'' — a practice which continued for nearly seven hun- 
dred years in England, for it did not cease until the 
accession of G-eorge the First. In France, it continued 
even later, — until 1776. The long duration and the 
universal faith in the virtues of the royal touch appear to 
us of the present day a most unaccountable delusion. It 
seems to have been attributed to some mysterious sanc- 
tity in the character or functions of an anointed king; 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. Ill 



and when we read of it in connection with a saintly 
sovereign like Edward the Confessor^ and in a remote 
age, the distance of time and the character of the 
monarch seem to hallow it, and one hesitates to treat it 
contemptuously as an absurd medical superstition. But 
when we come down to times less than two hundred 
years ago, to the reign of an English king who certainly 
had nothing very sacred or sacerdotal in his character, — 
I mean Charles the Second, — it is amazing to read of a 
registry which shows that, in the space of twenty years, 
that merry monarch touched no less than ninety-two 
thousand one hundred and seven persons for the '' king's 
evil," — the malady having, I suppose, accumulated during 
the Commonwealth and the Protectorate, although Crom- 
well appears to have played the king by trying his hand 
at the cure. When Francis the First, of France, was a 
prisoner at Madrid, after the battle of Pavia, he touched 
a great number of the sick; and on one day, Easter 
Sunday, in 1686, Louis the Fourteenth touched no fewer 
than sixteen hundred persons. I mention these things 
to show how extensively this extraordinary usage pre- 
vailed. It is not, however, my business to attempt any 
solution of it — to choose between the miracle of the royal 
touch and the marvel of a credulity which endured for 
seven or eight centuries, and in the minds not only of 
many thousands, but, as far as evidence goes, in the 
minds of all. But in France and in England it was 
accompanied with stated and solemn service of prayer, 
and the cure was attributed to the mercy of God rather 
than to the hand of man; and, therefore, I will not 
speak of it with mockery or contempt. I think there is 
truer wisdom and better feeling in simply contemplating 



112 LECTURE THIRD. 



it as the sage imagination of Shakspeare has taught us 
to look on it through the vision of the characters in 
Macbeth. 

When Malcolm and Macduff have fled to England, it 
is in the palace of Edward the Confessor that Malcolm 
inquires of an English doctor — 

" Comes the king forth, I pray you ?" 
and the answer is — 

"Ay, sir: there are a crew of wretched souls 
That stay his cure : their malady convinces 
The great assay of art; but, at his touch, 
Such sanctity hath heaven given his hand, 
They presently amend." 

When Macduff asks — 

"What's the disease he means ?" 

Malcolm answers — 

" 'Tis called the evil : 
A most miraculous work in this good king ; 
Which often, since my here-remain in England, 
I have seen him do. How he solicits heaven, 
Himself best knows : but strangely-visited people. 
All swoln and ulcerous, pitiful to the eye, 
The mere despair of surgery, he cures ; 
Hanging a golden stamp about their necks, 
Put on with holy prayers : and 'tis spoken, 
To the succeeding royalty he leaves 
The healing benediction. With this strange virtue 
He hath a heavenly gift of prophecy ; 
And sundry blessings hang about his throne. 
That speak him full of grace."* 

* Though entirely aside from the context, I am tempted to note, 
that in this same scene will be found lurking one of the most beautiful 



THE ROMAN AND SAXON PERIODS. 113 



It was with this good man that the ancient and lawful 
lineage of the Saxon sovereigns ended, about the middle 
of the eleven.th century. An English historian closes 
this era of his country's annals in these words : 

" Our kings, in the castle of Windsor, live on the brink 
of the grave which opens to receive them. The throne 

of Shakspeare's lines, which no "beauty-selector" or compiler of qu(A 
tation-dictionaries has ever detected. It is Malcolm who says — 

"Angels are bright still, though the brightest fell : 
Though all things foul would wear the brows of grace, 
Yet grace must still look so." 

And, in this connection of quotations, I venture to quote a sprightly 
passage from a letter of my brother's which now lies before me : 

"I was/' he writes, "the other day, looking over 'Measure for 
Measure' to find a grand image which Froude mentions in one of his 
letters, but which got out of my memory after I had returned the 
* Remains' to the Library. By-the-by, did you ever notice how hard 
it is to lay your hand sometimes upon a grand thought or image in 
Shakspeare, which you have lost the clue to ? He puts it somewhere 
that you would not think of looking for it, or so incidentally that you 
overlook it — so differently from inferior writers, who put a flashy gilt 
frame round what they are proud of. I was obliged, therefore, to look 
over the play almost line by line, and, after all, did not find what I 
was looking for; but I did notice among other things a jewel of a sen- 
tence, in point of real English construction and unparsahleness, which 
I thought would delight you : 

* These poor informal women are no more 
But instruments of some more mightier member 
That sets them on.' 

In the same scene, was Shakspeare thinking of a Puritan heresy — 
though I am not sure the error belongs to them, * the greater the sin- 
ner the greater the saint' — when he says — 

'They say, best men are moulded out of faults, 
And, for the most, become much more the better 
For being a little bad.' 

8 



114 LECTURE THIRD. 



of Edward was equally by the side of his sepulchre, for he 
dwelt in the palace of Westminster ; and, on the festival 
of the Epiphany, the day after his decease, his obsequies 
were solemnized in the adjoining abbey, then connected 
with the royal abode by walls and towers, the foundations 
whereof are still existing. Beneath the lofty windows of 
the southern transept of the abbey, you may see the deep 
and blackened arches, fragments of the edifice raised by 
Edward, supporting the chaste and florid tracery of a more 
recent age. Within, stands the shrine — once rich in gems 
and gold — ^raised to the memory of the Confessor by the 
fond devotion of his successors, despoiled, indeed, of all 
its ornaments, neglected and crumbling to ruin, but still 
surmounted by the massy, iron-bound oaken coffin which 
contains the ashes of the last legitimate Anglo-Saxon 
king." 

Baffled in finding the passage I was hunting, I was driven to get 
the * Remains' again, for the vexation of memory haunted me. Mr. 
Froude was struck with what he calls * a certain wild sublimity about 
it.* Speaking of respect for high places, the duke says — 

* Respect to your great place ! and let the Devil 
Be sometimes honoured for his burning throne.' " 

MS. Letter, 22d October, 1843. W. B. R. 



LECTURE lY.* 

g^z geigit of Jiirtg |o^tT. 

Interval between the last Saxon kings and King John — De- 
generacy of the Saxon race — Contagion of Danish vice — The 
Bristol slave-trade — The Northmen — The Normans — Their con- 
quests — Death of Harold — Effect of the conquest on the conquerors 
— Their despotism — The Royal Forest lands — The Curfew — Death 
of William the Norman — Tyranny of his successors — Marriage of 
Henry the First to a Saxon princess — The Plantagenets — Richard 
Cceur-de-Lion — Romance of Ivanhoe — Anselm, Archbishop of Can- 
terbury — King John, the first of the " Chronicle-Plays" — Imagina- 
tive power developed — John, a usurper — Shakspeare's view of his 
character — " England" the great idea of the play — Falconbridge its 
exponent — His character — Shakspeare's power "in minimis" — 
James Gurney's four words — France and Austria — Constance and 
Arthur — His death — Pandulph — Struggle with the Papacy — Inno- 
cent the Third — Stephen Langton — The interdict — Struggle with 
the barons — The Great Charter — Shakspeare's English loyalty. 

The main subject of this lecture will be tbe reign and 
times of King Jobn. In proceeding to it, I desire to 
connect that period of English history with the epoch 
with which I closed my last lecture; and thus, by rapidly 
noticing the intervening times, to preserve the continuity 
of our historical view of England. 

The last event which I spoke of was the death of that 
meek and saintly sovereign, Edward the Confessor, and, 



January 18th, 1847. 

115 



116 LECTURE FOURTH. 



in Ws death, the ending of the legitimate dynasty of the 
Anglo-Saxon kings, — the race of Cerdic, the King of 
Wessex, which had ruled the land for more than five 
hundred years. This, it will be remembered, was about 
the middle of the eleventh century; and at the close of 
the succeeding century began the reign of King John. 
The interval of about one hundred and forty years was an 
eventful period, which I cannot attempt to do more than 
glance swiftly over. 

The Saxon race had become degenerate — the race 
which could boast of Alfred and Athelstan — which had 
produced heroic kings and sent forth saintly men to bear 
the Christian faith unto other lands. The best part of 
the old Saxon character was wasted away in widespread 
licentiousness and debauchery. The people had grown 
to be sensual and self-indulgent and riotous ; revelry was 
their habit, with no better excuse than that the Danes 
had taught them to drink deep. 

Danish vice became also Saxon vice; and, worse an 
hundred-fold, a horrid slave-trade shows into what deep 
and cruel profligacy England, at that time, was sunk. 
The town of Bristol was an established slave-market, and 
this detested traffic was carried on by Saxons of high 
rank, who sold their own countrymen; and into Saxon 
hands the price was paid for Saxon peasants, menials, 
and servile vassals of every description, who were carried 
away from their native land to dwell in Denmark and 
Ireland, homeless, because in slavery.* There was such 



* " Slave ships regularly sailed from Bristol to Ireland, where they 
were secure of a ready and profitable market." Lingard, vol. i. 
p. 376, ch. vii. W. B. R. 



THE REIGN OF KING JOHN. 117 



depravity in England, that, though the sensual, deaf in 
their debauchery and wickedness, heard it not, the cry 
went up to Heaven for vengeance. The national corrup- 
tion seemed to provoke national retribution ; and when it 
came, it was in fierce and bloody chastisement. "The 
Saxons," as has been eloquently said, " had not been left 
without warning. Judgment had followed judgment. ' 
The Dane had fulfilled his mission, yet there was no 
improvement. They had seen, too, among them, with all 
the stern holiness and fiery zeal of an ancient prophet, 
startling and terrible as the Danes themselves, Dunstan 
the Archbishop, who had dragged a king from his cham- 
ber of shame. Yet they would not rouse themselves": 
the wine-cup was too sweet, the couch too soft: Hhe joys 
of the hall,' the story, the song, the ^glee-beams' of the 
harp, — these gladdened their days ; and to these, in spite 
of the Danes and St. Dunstan, they clung faster and 
faster. The dream went on; the lethargy became 
heavier. * * * * 

"At last the stroke came; more terrible in its reality 
than the most anxious had imagined. It was not merely 
a change of kings or families ; not even an invasion or 
ordinary conquest; it was a rooting and tearing up, a 
wild overthrow of all that was established and familiar in 
England. 

" There were seeds of good, of high and rare excellence 
in the Saxons; so they were to be chastised, not de- 
stroyed. Those who saw the Norman triumph, and the 
steady, crushing strength of its progress, who saw English 
feelings, English customs, English rights, trampled on, 
mocked at, swept away, little thought that the Norman, 
the " Francigena," was to have no abiding name in the 



118 LECTURE FOURTH. 



land of his conquest ; that his language was to he swal- 
lowed up and lost in that of the Saxon j that it was for 
the glorj and final exaltation of the English race that he 
was commissioned to school them thus sternly. So, 
indeed, it was. But on that generation the judgment 
fell, as bitter as it was unexpected; it was, in their 
eyes, vengeance unrelenting and final; it seemed as 
if Grod had finally cast them ofi", and given them 
over, without hope of respite or release, to their tor- 
mentors.^^* 

In closing the last lecture, the latest event in English 
history to which I alluded was the death of Edward the 
Confessor, the last legitimate Anglo-Saxon king. There 
still remained a few stormy months of the Saxon times — 
a disputed succession, brief and tumultuous — an unsteady 
tenure of the throne, and a bloody death. The eyes of 
the gentle and pious Edward had been spared the vision 
of the sufferings that were so soon to befall the nation. 
The wild reign of Harold, in which the Saxon dynasty 
passed away, occupied less than a year in that period 
when, after the world had completed a thousand years in 
the Christian era, there was strange and wide-spread dis- 
may in the hearts of men, and dim apprehensions that 
the day of judgment was nigh at hand. The great comet 
of the year 1060 appeared ; and, as it waved over Eng- 
land, the Saxon looked up to the sky with terror, when 
he beheld what seemed to him a portent of the sword of 
the invader or the destroyer. The Saxon vainly strove to 
drown his fears in revelry and riot, or else awaited in 



* This striking quotation I am unable to trace to its source. 

W. B. R. 



THE REIGN OF KING JOHN. 119 



dread suspense the moment wlien the comet should, as 
Milton describes it, — 

" Shake from its horrid hair 
Pestilence and war." 

In tumult and slaughter had the Saxon rule been esta- 
blished in Britain; and, after six hundred years duration, 
it ended, in like manner, in confusion and bloodshed. 
Brother was warring against brother for the throne, and 
the Norwegian king, with his pirates of the North, was 
summoned to unnatural alliance in the fraternal strife. 
Harold's short reign had its one victory, but it was a vic- 
tory that left dead on the field not only the King of Nor- 
way, but his own brother. In his season of victory, — ^his 
hand wet with a brother's blood, — ^he was told that the 
ships of the Normans had set sail from the ports of 
France, and were approaching the shores of England. 

What race of men was this that Normandy was sending 
forth on this voyage of conquest ? The Normans, as de- 
scribed by an old historian, were the flower of the Swedes, 
the Danes, and the Norwegians. They had dwelt, indeed, 
long enough in France to learn a stranger's speech, but, 
originally, they were kindred with the Saxons ; and it is 
curious to observe, in the progress of English history, 
how the various tribes of the great Teutonic race were 
brought into fierce collision, and how their union was 
again cemented by blood. The Northmen were for 
a long while the most adventurous and roving race of 
European men : they penetrated into the Mediterranean ; 
they swept the coasts of the Northern Sea, and sailed 
into the navigable rivers of central Europe, striking such 
terror that the ancient litanies contained prayers for 



LECTURE FOURTH. 



deliverance from the fury of the Northmen. They won 
from a king of France that fair province to which 
they gave their name of Normandy; and, in that 
same century, another portion of the Northmen, undis- 
mayed by the dread of an Arctic and unknown sea, are 
believed to have sailed westward, and, making Iceland 
their stepping-stone, as it were, in the ocean, to have 
passed onward and reached America five hundred years 
before Columbus. 

The Northmen who settled in France became Chris- 
tianized and civilized; and, in the next century, retain- 
ing all their spirit of adventure, they went forth, not as 
heathen pirates, but as Christian soldiers. One band of 
them crossed the Alps to make a Norman settlement in 
Southern Italy, and stiU farther on, to raise the Christian 
banner over the crescent of the Saracens in the island of 
Sicily. But a mightier conquest was that which a few 
years later was achieved over the Saxons, and by which 
a duke of Normandy became Eang of England. I need 
not stop to tell you how bravely the unhappy Harold met 
the invaders on the field of Hastings, and how he fell in 
that battle which sealed the destiny of Saxon independ- 
ence. In less than one year after the good King Ed- 
ward, the sainted Confessor, had breathed his last, the 
crown of England was on the brow of William the 
Norman. 

The Norman conquest was the last of those great revo- 
lutionary changes, which successively occurred in the for- 
mation of that great community of mankind, which is now 
peopling the vast and scattered territoiy of the colonial 
British Empire, and the western regions of America. It 
was the addition of tlie last element in the constitution 



THE REIGN OP KING JOHN. 121 



of a great modern people. We liave thus seen how 
ancient British nationality received into itself a Roman 
nationality, and then the Saxon and the Dane, and, last 
of all, the Norman. 

"The Norman conquest," says Southey, "is the most 
momentous event in English history, — perhaps the most 
momentous in the Middle Ages. So severe a chastise- 
ment was never, except in the case of the Visigoths, 
inflicted on any nation which was not destroyed by it.'^* 
It is an important subject of historical inquiiy to ascer- 
tain the nature and extent of the changes — both social 
and political — which were consequent on this revolution. 
It is far too large a subject, even if I had the ability, for 
me to attempt to do more than merely touch on. The 
prominent events of this period are of such a character as 
to fill the mind to the exclusion of other less striking 
realities. This page of history tells of a kingdom con- 
quered in one battle — the Saxon sovereign dead on that 
battle-field, and his army slaughtered or routed ; it tells 
of Saxon fugitives in other and distant lands, and of 
Saxon prelates thrust out to make room for Norman 
ecclesiastics — of Saxon thane and S?xon peasants outcast 
from house and home — of the introduction of a sterner 
form of feudal law, and even the people's language revo- 
lutionized. It tells of that peculiar stretch of despotic 
power, by which, at the dismal sound of the curfew-bell, 
lamps and fires were extinguished at an early hour, — 
"the lights that cherish household cares and festive glad- 
ness'' quenched by that stern bidding. When one thinks 
of the long, English winter-nights, this curfew-darkness 

* Southey's Naval History, vol. i. p. 123. 



122 LECTURE FOURTH. 



seems almost as gloomy as tliat savage age, which Charles 
Lamb speaks of, in the essay in which he eulogizes candle- 
light as a kindlier luminary than sun or moon. " Want- 
ing it/^ says he, "what savage, unsocial nights must our 
ancestors have spent, wintering in caves and unillumined 
fastnesses ! They must have lain about and grumbled at 
one another in the dark. What repartees could have 
passed when you must have felt about for a smile, and 
handled a neighbour's cheek to be sure that he under- 
stood it?''* We read, too, how, when exasperated by 
Saxon resistance, the Conqueror swore a dreadful oath, 
that not one Northumbrian should escape his vengeance; 
and then hastened to fulfil it by his exterminating cam- 
paign in the North, in which one hundred thousand persons 
are said to have perished, and not a single inhabited village 
was left between Durham and York. It was a scene of 
devastation and depopulation like Hyder All's invasion of 
the Carnatie, made famous by the eloquence of Burke. 

Such was the fearful penalty of the Conqueror's re- 
venge, and scarcely less fearful was the penalty of 
his pleasure: the Norman monarchs must have their 
hunting-grounds, and the Saxon must needs give up his 
cultivated lands, not only to the new Norman proprietor, 
but even to the wild beasts. William, it has been said, 
^^ had a summary way of increasing the forest lands : no 
need of planting trees or waiting for the slow growth of 
oaks and beeches. There were then many woods in merry 
England, and he simply swept away the homes of the 
villagers who dwelt among and near them, so that the 
lands returned to their natural state of wilderness, and 

* Popular Fallacies, xv. 



THE REIGN OF KING JOHN. 128 



the stag crouched^ undisturbed, on the hearth of the 
peasant, or in the long fern where once was the altar of 
the village church."* 

It is under such circumstances that, in a very brief 
space of time, there was established a foreign king, a 
foreign prelacy, and a foreign nobility; and it would 
seem, at least to our first impressions, that the Saxon 
race was not only bowed .down, but crushed, beneath the 
Norman yoke ; and that the Saxon era, with all its influ- 
ences, was abruptly divided from later times by a broad 
line of blood, and a black line of fire and devastation. 
But great as were the changes, and terrible as were the 
sufierings, which the Norman conquest brought into Eng- 
land, it was not such a revolution as destroyed the conti- 
nuity of the nation's life. It is said by the historian who 
has written with most learning on this period, that "we 
attribute overmuch to the Norman conquest. "f This 
opinion seems just when we turn our thoughts away from 
the violence I have been speaking of, and consider that 
the laws of Edward the Confessor were not abolished by 
the victorious invader; that Saxon earls sat in the council 
of the realm by the side of the Norman counts; that not a 
few of the lesser thanes retained possession of their lands, 
and that the Anglo-Saxon population continued unbroken. 

As the body of William the First was about to be 
committed to its grave, (it was in a churchyard in Nor- 
mandy,) when the mass had been performed, and an eulogy 
pronounced on his character, a voice, from the crowd of 



* Lives of the English Saints, No. vii. Introduction to the Life of 
St. Gilbert, p. 2. 
f Palgrave's English Commonwealth, Part i. 653. 



LECTURE FOURTH. 



priests and people, exclaimed : '^ He whom you have 
praised was a robber. The very land on which you 
stand is mine. By violence he took it from my father; 
and, in the name of God, I forbid you to bury him in 
it.'^* It was an awful rebuke to the pride and injustice 
of military conquest, when a price had to be paid over 
the Conqueror's lifeless body to obtain a few feet of earth 
for the grave of him who, in his life, had added a king- 
dom to his ancient duchy. 

The miseries of England continued during the reigns 
of the Conqueror's sons; and it was when all Christen- 
dom was moved by the splendid enthusiasm of the First 
Crusade, that the land was scourged with the ferocious 
tyranny of William Eufus, — ^the progressive wickedness 
of whose nature was strongly described when it was said 
that ^' never a night came but he lay down a worse man 
than he rose, and never a morning but he rose worse 
than he lay down.'^f He died the death of a wild beast ; 
for all that is surely known is, that he was found in the 
New Forest, transfixed with an arrow and dead. Whether 
that arrow was sped to the tyrant's breast by the pur- 
posed aim of Walter Tyrrel, or by some one else who 
drew the bow in the wild spirit of revenge, or whether it 
was so guided by what we call chance, the people of the 
time beheld in his death retribution, not only on the 
cruelty and impiety of Eufus, but on the sins of his 
father, who had laid waste the homes of the Saxons to 
make the hi nting-ground where, in the loneliness of the 
forest, his son miserably bled to death. 



* Lingard, vol, ii. p. 54. 

t British Critic, June, 1843, vol. xxxiii. p. 46. Article on St. Anselm. 



THE REIGN OF KING JOHN. 125 



The gradual change in the relations of the Saxon and 
Norman races is shown by the marriage of Henry the 
First to a Saxon princess, which led,. soon afterwards, to 
the restoration of the Saxon line in the person of Henry 
the Second. I must pass over the tumultuous usurpation 
of Stephen, and the imperial reign of the first of the 
Plantagenets, distinguished by that great controversy 
worthy of all candid and careful study, — " the struggle,'^ 
as Coleridge describes it, ^^ between the men of arms and 
of letters in the persons of Henry the Second and Thomas 
^-Becket.^' To reach the special subject from which I 
have been longer detained than I anticipated, and for 
which I am therefore leaving myself less room, I must 
pass, too, over the reign of the heroic Crusader, the lion- 
hearted Richard, merely remarking that there may be found 
in the romance of Ivanhoe, not only one of the most vivid 
representations which Sir Walter Scott has given of the 
life of a distant age, but also a life-like exhibition of the 
relations which subsisted between the two races, when 
they were not yet completely amalgamated into one 
people. He has represented the partially extinct hos- 
tility which imbittered the feelings of the haughty Nor- 
mans on the one side, and, on the other, not only the 
Saxon serf, but the high-born thane, whose lineage was 
from the kings or nobles of England before the Conquest. 

It is comparatively easy to understand the hostile atti- 
tude in which, during these times, the Saxons and the 
Normans stood towards each other; for the angry passions 
of men, and the deeds which are prompted by such feel- 
ings, are always more manifest than the influences by 
which old animosities are appeased. It is easier to com- 
prehend how men are brought to hate one another, than 



126 LECTURE FOURTH. 



how that mutual hatred is converted to harmony and 
peace. Years, and countless and incalculable influences, 
may be needed to soothe the resentments engendered by 
one battle; especially when, like the battle of Hastings, 
it is a victory of invasion. It would be a subject of 
deep interest to trace the various and manifold agencies 
working upon the hearts and habits of the Saxons and 
the Normans, as they dwelt in the same region, at length 
producing national unity. I cannot pass by one import- 
ant influence in this harmonizing process — an influence 
of the church, which has been thus described by a 
living English author : 

^^When Anselm (it was in the reign of the second 
William) came over from his Norman convent to be 
•Archbishop of Canterbury, and his victorious countrymen 
thought that he, of course, would look upon the old 
Saxons of the soil as they did, he told them plainly, that 
a churchman acknowledged no distinction of race, and 
that his vocation was to be the friend of the poor and 
distressed wherever he met with them. And these prin- 
ciples, of course with great exceptions and deviations, 
were acted upon by a large portion of the Norman 
bishops and clergy. What was the effect? We grew 
up to be an English nation. The Saxon serf felt that he 
had a portion and a right in the soil j he recollected the 
sounds of his native language; he began to speak it: 
in due time the conquerors and the conquered became 
one." 

The Crusades, too, had probably, by means of the 
predominant feeling which they inspired, helped to fuse 
together the Saxon and Norman elements of English 
nationality; and, when we reach the times of King 



THE REIGN OF KING JOHN. 127 



John, and enter the thirteenth century, we find the 
distinction of the two races wholly passed away. 

Shakspeare's play of King John is the first, in order 
of time, of those ^^Chronicle-Plays,'' which he gave to his 
country and the world with the title, originally, of ^^ His- 
tories." It gives a dramatic and imaginative view of an 
important reign in the annals of England; and the per- 
sonages, events, and dates, are subjected to the transmut- 
ing processes of a great poet's imagination, so as not only 
not to darken or distort historic truth, but to array it in 
a living light. We gain a deeper and more abiding sense 
of the truth, by the help of that fine function of poetic 
genius, by which the imagination gives unity and moral 
connection to events that stand apart and unrelated. As 
to a distant period, time works in harmony with the poet. 
"The history of our ancient kings," says Coleridge, — 
"the events of their reigns, I mean, — are like stars in 
the sky : whatever the real interspaces may be, and how- 
ever great, they seem close to each other. The stars — 
the events — strike us and remain in our eye, little modi- 
fied by the difference of dates. An historic drama is, 
therefore, a collection of events borrowed from history, 
but connected together, in respect of cause and time, 
poetically, and by dramatic fiction."* 

The historic poet must carry his subject into the world 
of imagination; and, in dealing with the multitude of 
historic men and their deeds, he must do what every 
true artist, be he poet, painter, or architect, has to do — 
he must impress the mind with an harmonious sense of 
plurality and unity. Each character, each action, must 

* Literary Remains, vol. ii. p. 161. 



128 LECTURE FOURTH. 



have its own individuality, but this must be controlled 
by some pervading and predominant idea whicli blends 
all tbe parts into unity; the very contrasts, in themselves 
so needful, must be subordinated to a certain concord, just 
as in a picture there must be a rich variety, but it must 
have its central point, and every thing must illustrate the 
main idea of it : a landscape, with all its varied imagery 
of nature, must have, withal, some one prevailing spirit, 
be it tranquil or tempestuous. You cannot have on the 
same canvas the waves in angry agitation and the trees 
in motionless repose, or else making no more than what 
the poet calls— 

" A soft eye-music of slow -■waving boughs."* 

In approaching these admirable dramatic histories, I 
have stopped thus briefly to notice how the imagination 
in every sphere of art of a high order treats the multipli- 
city of its materials. This is so essential to the just com- 
prehension of the historic drama, that I am tempted to 
borrow from a contemporary writer a fine passage on the 
philosophy of art and poetry : — ^^ Every theory of beauty 
embraces two elements at once. One colour will not con- 
stitute a picture; and yet, over a. variety of colours, there 
must be thrown one tint and colour. One line will not 
form a statue ; and yet, from a multiplicity of lines, the 
sculptor must place before the eye some one consistent 
image. A building is a crystallization of forms; yet 
towers, pinnacles, arches and vaults, aisles and niches, 
fretted roofs and sculptured corbels, windows flaming 
with all the colours of the rainbow, and carvings wrought 

* Wordsworth. Lines on Airey Force Valley, p. 192. 



THE REIGN OF KING JOHN. 



into a labyrinth of network, — all these, when brought 
together by the hand of a master, are framed and dove- 
tailed into one grand plan, realizing one idea, permeated 
with one spirit. The poet brings upon the stage not one, 
but a multitude of characters; he represents life in all 
its forms, the human mind in all its phases; his very 
excellence consists in the comprehensiveness and versa- 
tility of his conceptions. • But if he understand his art, 
he will link together not only his acts and events by their 
relation to some one end, but even the most sudden 
changes and incongruities by some main key-note. When 
Shakspeare passes at once from the awfulness of Mac- 
beth' s thoughts after the murder of Duncan to the vulgar 
ribaldry of the porter at the gate, he makes that ribaldry 
turn upon the thought of hell. So it is in music — so it 
is in oratory — so it is in every production of human 
fancy: simplicity and variety; intricacy and regularity ; 
order amid seeming confusion, and multiplicity in appa- 
rent identity; discords harmonized ; contrasts reconciled; 
deficiencies supplied; irregularities corrected; — these are 
the triumphs of art. But the triumph is achieved only 
when both elements are preserved together — distinct but 
not separate — combined but not confused.'^* 

The first scene of the tragedy of King John has that 
significancy which distinguishes the openings of Shak- 
speare' s plays — an intimation of the whole plot, the full 
meaning of which is regularly developed in the progress of 
the drama. In almost the first words. King John's royalty 
is spoken of as ^^ borrowed majesty," and he is summoned 
by the embassy of his great contemporary, Philip Au- 



* Sewell's Christian Politics, p. 18. 
9 



130 LECTURE FOURTH. 



gustus of France, to yield his kingdom up to the rightful 
heir, Arthur Plantagenet, the son of his dead brother, 
Geoffrey. The succession of John was usurpation, begin- 
ning in fraud and violence, and continued in crime ; but 
of the previous Norman reigns, four out of six of the 
kings had possessed themselves of the sceptre by the law 
of the strong hand. The rule of succession could, 
therefore, as yet be scarcely considered as established; 
but, instead of it, there seems to have been, in that 
unsettled political condition, little more than what Rob 
Roy calls — 

"The good old rule, the simple plan, 
That they should take who hare the power, 
And they should keep who can."* 

When this is considered, and when we remember, too, 
that the absence of Richard on the Crusade gave peculiar 
opportunities to his brother John to pave the way to the 
succession, it is not surprising that John became the 
king, especially as the righful heir was in his youth, and 
the government had not yet attained that period when, 
under constitutional forms, a minority reign becomes 
practicable. Accordingly, at the opening of the drama, 
Shakspeare does not at once awaken indignation at the 
injustice of the usurpation, and, indeed, rather leads us 
to admire the calm royal bearing with which the king 
answers the threat of war; as if, unconscious of wrong to 
his nephew, he relies upon his "strong possession and his 
right,'^ and confidently hurls back defiance to the King 
of France. "We see, therefore, from the veiy beginning, 

* Wordsworth's Rob Roy's Grave, p. 243. 



THE REIGN OF KING JOHN. 131 



how differently, and in how much finer a spirit, Shak- 
speare treats the character of King John, than that coarse 
and common mode, by which it has been represented in 
such black and unrelieved colours that no humanity can 
be found in him, and he is looked on with unmitigated 
horror and contempt. It has been said with reference to 
the ^' vivid speaking characters'^ in which Shakspeare has 
placed so many of the English kings in imperishable 
individuality before us, — "Only look at his King John, 
look at any historian's. Which gives you the liveliest, 
faithfullest representation of that prince and of his age, 
the poet's or the historian's? Which most powerfully ex- 
poses his vices and awakens the greatest horror at them ? 
Yet in Shakspeare he is still a man, and, as such, comes 
within the range of our sympathy: we can pity, even 
while we shudder at him; and our horror moves us to 
look inward into the awful depths of the nature which 
we share with him, instead of curdling into dead hatred 
and disgust. In the historian's he is a sheer monster, 
the object of contemptuous loathing, a poisonous reptile 
whom we could crush to death with as little remorse as a 
viper.'^* 

The tragedy begins with the voice of state, of diplo- 
macy, of policy, and of the rivalry of England and 
France ; and we shall see how, in the various characters, 
all the elements of mediaeval life are present — the papacy 
and the priesthood — the monarchy and the nobility — the 
commonalty and the soldiery — all are there. It has, 
however, been ingeniously said by a German critic that — 
" The hero of this piece stands not in the list of person- 

* Hare's Guesses at Truth, First Series, p. 355. 



132 LECTURE FOUETH. 



ages, and could not stand with them, for the idea should 
be clear without personification. The hero is England."* 
This means, as I understand it, that Shakspeare has 
made England the great and ever-present idea of the 
play; that, without any artifice of national vanity, he 
has so written the history of the reign of King John af* 
to inspire a deep and fervid spirit of nationality. It is 
comparatively an easy thing to animate the hearts of a 
people with such a spirit by presenting the glorious parts 
of their country's annals; the mere touch of the memory 
of victories won by their ancestors will kindle enthusiasm 
and pride in the breasts of posterity. We can understand 
how the recollection, for example, of the splendid career 
of Edward the Third should prompt the boast of the 
Britons of later times : 

""We are the sons of the men 

Who conquered on Cressy's plain; 
And -what our fathers did, 
Their sons can do again." 

But it was Shakspeare' s arduous achievement to fire 
the sentiment of patriotism with the story of a reign that 
was tyrannical, oppressive, cowardly, — a period of usurpa- 
tion and national degradation. He has accomplished this 
chiefly by means of one character, which is almost alto- 
gether a creation of his mind from very slight historical 
materials. The fertile imagination of the poet, and his 
genial exuberance of happy and gentle feelings, seem to 
have craved something more than the poverty of the his- 
tory supplies ; he wanted somebody better than a king, 

*■ Franz Horn, vol. ii. p. 196. 



THE REIGN OF KING JOHN. 133 



better than a worldly ecclesiastic, and better than the 
bold but fickle barons. It is in the highest order of dra- 
matic art, and especially in the historic drama, that 
Shakspeare, on no other historical basis than the mere 
existence of a natural son of Richard, has created the 
splendid and most attractive character of Philip Falcon- 
bridge. Besides playing an important part himself, he 
fulfils something like the function of the chorus of the 
ancient drama ; for he seems to illustrate the purposes of 
the history, and to make the real personages more intelli- 
gible. He is the imbodiment, too, of the most genuine 
national feeling, and is truer to his country than king or 
noble. With an abounding and overflowing humour, a 
dauntless courage, and a gentleness of spirit that charac- 
terizes true heroism, Falconbridge carries a generous 
strength and a rude morality of his own, amid the craft 
and the cruelties and the feebleness of those who sur- 
round him. The character, imaginary as it is, has an 
historical value also in this, that it represents the bright 
side of feudal loyalty. Honoured by the king. Falcon- 
bridge never deserts him in his hour of need and pgril, 
when the nobles are flying ofi" from their allegiance and a 
foreign enemy is at hand. It is no servile fidelity, but 
such genuine and generous loyalty that we look upon it 
as faithfulness to his country rather than adherence to 
the fortunes of the king. He is, as it were, the man of 
the people in the play, and we hear him prompting brave 
actions and a generous policy — encouraging the feeble 
king to a truer kingly career ; we see him withstanding 
the haughty barons, and still more indignant at papal 
aggression. He dwells in an atmosphere of heartlessness 
and villainy, but it pollutes him not; rather does his 



134 LECTURE FOURTH. 



presence partially purify it. It is remarkable that we do 
not and cannot, I think, associate him injuriously with 
the character of King John, with whose fortunes he is 
identified, but from whose vices he is wholly aloof; and I 
am almost tempted to apply to him what has been said 
of a very different character : 

" His soul was like a star and dwelt apart."* 

The character and position of Falconbridge in the 
play, seem to me finely to illustrate the workings of the 
principle of chivalry during this early feudal period 
of history, — that principle of which Mr. Burke wisely 
said that — "Without confounding rank, it produced a 
noble equality, and handed it down through all the gra- 
dations of social life. It was this opinion," said that 
philosophic statesman, "which mitigated kings into com- 
panions, and raised private men to be fellows with 
kings.'^f The effects of the principle of chivalry, as 
manifested in the intercourse of King John and Falcon- 
bridge, cannot escape observation ; but the reader of the 
drapaa may probably overlook a very short passage which 
seems to me to illustrate the workings of it as it passes 
down, to use Mr. Burke's phrase, through all the grada- 
tions of life and touches the humbler range of society. 
It is a passage which struck the fancy of Coleridge, who 
was in the habit of quoting it as an instance of Shak- 
speare's power in minimis; and it certainly does show 
how comprehensively careful a poet's genius is of minute 
as well as of great things. In the list of the persons of 



* "Wordsworth's Sonnet written in London in 1802, p. 255. 
f Reflections on the French Revolution, vol. iii. p. 98. 



THE REIGN OF KING JOHN. 135 



the play, you may notice the name of ^' James Gurney, 
servant to Lady Falconbridge/' He makes his appearance 
once, — ^but once, — then only for a very little while ; he 
does not speak till spoken to, says four words, — scarce 
more than four monosyllables, — then ^^ Exit James Gur- 
ney,'' and that is all. Yet Coleridge speaks of the cha- 
racter of this person, and finds it in these very few words 
— ^that single touch of Shakspeare's pen portraying the 
afiectionate respectfulness of an aged domestic* When 
Falconbridge is about to extort from his mother the secret 
of his parentage, a sense of delicacy leads him to desire a 
conference with her alone, and he requests the attendant 
to withdraw, saying, — 

"James Gurney, wilt thou give us leave awhile?" 

and the meek answer, which pleased Coleridge's fancy, 
is simply — 

" Good leave, good Philip." 

I refer to the passage for a reason different from Cole- 
ridge's, and to notice the spirit of Falconbridge' s playful 
reply, as he says — 

" James, 
There's toys abroad. Anon I'll tell thee more." 

Now, I beg you to notice the familiar and aJBTectionate 
tone of this intercourse, as they address each other by 
their Christian names, '^Philip" and " James ;^' and then 
the fine, gentlemanly, and considerate feeling which 
prompts Falconbridge to promise the old servant — his 



* Table Talk, p. 35. Ed. 1852. 



136 LECTURE FOURTH. 



old domestic friend — to tell him more after awhile, as a 
kind of indirect apology for even asking him to withdraw. 
Minute as the instance is, it is an historical illustration 
of the gentleness with which the genuine principles of 
chivalry looked down to the humble, as well as upward to 
the high born. 

The alliances of France and Austria, which are, at the 
beginning, proclaimed in support of Arthur's claim to the 
throne of England against King John, are soon dissolved. 
A new wind of policy blows over them, and the friend- 
ship of king and duke, which a little before had been 
proffered to the helpless and injured Arthur with so 
much of pomp and declamatory assurance, all passes 
away ; his cause is abandoned . new friendships and a 
different policy are formed on the instant. The hollow- 
ness and heartlessness of this conduct are more deeply 
felt when we behold the wild anguish of Constance, in 
desperate disappointment, clamouring for the lost rights of 
her child; and, as if the huge firm earth could alone 
support a grief so great as hers, seating herself on the 
ground for kings to come and bow to her loneliness and 
desolation. 

The contrast between the beauty, the strength, and 
grandeur of natural feeling, and the ugliness and the 
instability of the politic zeal of ambitious kings and 
princes, is felt, not only when we are listening to the 
voluble utterances of maternal passion, but when we turn 
to the gentle exclamations of the innocent Arthur, as he 
would fain escape the turmoil of an ambitious destiny : 

''Good my mother, peace ! 
I would that T were low laid in my grave : 
I am not worth this coil that's made for me." 



THE REIGN OP KING JOHN. 13V 



The peace of the grave was speedily to be the portion 
of this unhappy prince, — a youth whose character history 
has not especially deigned to record ; but we can believe 
that he was, in truth, the thoughtful and gentle-hearted 
being that Shakspeare has shown to us, not only in his 
own actions and speech, but as he was endeared to the 
agitated affections of Constance. In his brief life we 
behold the sacrificial beauty and purity, which seem to 
mark him for the victim of the selfish and wicked pas- 
sions that are raging around him. 

The treaty between John and Philip Augustus, built 
on the sandy foundation of a broken faith and foresworn 
promises, proved an unstable and hollow armistice, as 
if the wild prayer of Constance, in her hour of desola- 
tion, had a speedy answer, when, deserted by earthly 
alliances, she cried — 

"Arm, arm, you heavens, against these perjured kings ! 
A widow cries ; be husband to me, heavens ! 
Let not the hours of this ungodly day 
Wear out the day in peace ; but, ere sunset. 
Set armed discord 'twixt these perjured kings !" 

In that renewed war the destiny of Arthur was sealed : he 
fell into the power of his victorious uncle, — the young and 
rightful claimant of the English crown was in the peril- 
ous possession of the wicked usurper. Two words more 
— a prison — death — close the story of the career of 
Arthur of Brittany. Impenetrable mystery hangs over 
his death, and all that can be discerned in the darkness 
of it is, the guilt of King John. How he died is not 
known -, but history, tradition, poetry, all have laid the 
guilt of that death upon the conscience of King John, 
whose cowardice and cruelty were someway the agents of 



138 LECTURE FOURTH. 



the murder. The essential guilt lies there^ and it does 
not matter greatly, whether Arthur pined away in prison 
to an early death, or whether he perished in an attempt 
to escape, or whether John perpetrated the deed of hor- 
ror with his own hand, in mid-river loneliness and mid- 
night silence, by plunging his dagger into the bosom of 
his helpless kinsman, and then casting the poor child's 
bleeding body into the deep waters of the river Seine. 

It does not belong to my subject to comment on the 
matchless dramatic skill of those two great scenes, — that 
appalling one in which the king commits Arthur to the 
deadly keeping of Hubert, and that other piteous one 
between Hubert and Arthur. In the consummate poetic 
art of those scenes, there is, at the same time, a no less 
admirable historic charity; for, in the obscurity of the 
history, Shakspeare has impressed the mind with a deep 
sense of the guilt of the king without aggravating it with 
needless horrors or more than human atrocity. Arthur, 
in the play, perishes in his attempt at escape ; but to the 
perilous leap that caused his death he was driven by the 
dread of John's power; and he had already, by John's 
cruel purpose, endured the terror and anguish at the 
presence of the executioner and the sight of the instru- 
ments of torture. 

When Arthur fell by the fortune of war into the hands 
of King John, the possession of his young rival brought 
security to the usurper, but it brought also temptation to 
make assurance double sure by converting the custody of 
a prison into the inviolable custody of the grave. The 
moral view, and, I believe, a most just historic view, 
which Shakspeare gives us, is this — that, however the 
events are separated in time, all the after-misery of the 



THE REIGN OF KING JOHN. 



reign of King Jolin was the penal retribution for tlie 
murder of Arthur. In consequence of it, his continental 
dominions passed away from him, to make up the splendid 
French monarchy of the Capets, and at home he strug- 
gled through a distracted reign, amid disloyal nobles 
and a discontented people. The sequel of the reign, 
after Arthur is taken prisoner, is finely told in the play, 
when the deep political . sagacity of Cardinal Pandulph 
foretells the course of things. Exciting the Dauphin to 
claim the English throne, he bids him mark — 

"John hath seized Arthur; and it cannot be, 
That, whiles warm life plays in that infant's veins, 
The misplaced John should entertain an hour, 
One minute, nay, one quiet breath of rest : 
A sceptre, snatch'd with an unruly hand. 
Must be as boisterously maintained as gained ; 
And he, that stands upon a slippery place. 
Makes nice of no vile hold to stay him up : 
That John may stand, then Arthur needs must fall : 
So be it, for it cannot but be so." 

When the Dauphin questions what he is to gain by 
Arthur's fall, and doubts his success, the wily cardinal 
replies — 

"How green are you, and fresh in this old world ! 
John lays you plots ; the times conspire with you : 
For he, that steeps his safety in true blood. 
Shall find but bloody safety, and untrue. 
This act, so evilly born, shall cool the hearts 
Of all his people, and freeze up their zeal; 
That none so small advantage shall step forth, 
To check his reign, but they will cherish it; 
No natural exhalation in the sky. 
No scape of nature, no distempered day, 
No common wind, no customed event, 



140 LECTURE FOURTH. 



But they will pluck away his natural cause. 
And call them meteors, prodigies, and signs. 
Abortives, presages, and tongues of heaven. 
Plainly denouncing vengeance upon John. 
* * * The hearts 

Of all his people shall revolt from him, 
And kiss the lips of unacquainted change ; 
And pick strong matter of revolt and wrath 
Out of the bloody fingers' ends of John." 

It is just "before these cold-hearted and crafty spectda- 
tions respecting Arthur's death^ that Constance addressed 
the Cardinal with that beautiful and pathetic utterance of 
her first grief at her son's captivity: 

" Father Cardinal, I have heard you say. 
That we shall see and know our friends in heaven ; 
If that be true, I shall see my boy again ; 
For, since the birth of Cain, the first male child. 
To him that did but yesterday suspire. 
There was not such a gracious creature born. 
But now will canker-sorrow eat my bud, 
And chase the native beauty from his cheek, 
And he will look as hollow as a ghost; 
As dim and meagre as an ague's fit; 
And so he'll die; and, rising so again. 
When I shall meet him in the court of heaven 
I shall not know him : therefore, never, never 
Must I behold my pretty Arthur more." 

The words fall ineffectual on Pandulph's ear; and he 
who, with his sacred function, might have poured conso- 
lation into the aching void of a mother's heart-, answers 
with a rebuke. He was busy with intrigues of state, 
weaving meshes to catch or entangle kings; and what 
audience could maternal grief find with the crafty and 
corrupt priest, burdened with worldly policy, like such 



THE REIGN OF KING JOHN. 141 



Other cardinals as Wolsey and Richelieu and Mazarin 
and PortocarrerO; the politician-ecclesiastics of modern 
Europe ? 

When, with like coldness, King Philip — ^he who had 
selfishly advocated and selfishly abandoned the cause of 
Constance and her son — tells her she is 

" As fond of grief as of her child," 

she gives the last justification of her impassioned 
sorrow : 

"Grief fills the room up of my absent child, 
Lies in his bed, walks up and down with me, 
Puts on his pretty looks, repeats his words. 
Remembers me of all his gracious parts. 
Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form ; 
Then, have I reason to be fond of grief." 

The appearance of Cardinal Pandulph in this play 
introduces another of the great contests of this distracted 
reign, — the struggle between King John and the papal 
power during that splendid period of it, the papacy of 
Innocent the Third. The controversy turned on the 
election of the Primate of England, and John's refusal to 
admit Stephen Langton to the see of Canterbury. When 
the papal claim is asserted by Cardinal Pandulph, as the 
legate of the pope, it is answered by King J olm in a high 
strain of defiance, which arrays the independence of his 
realm and sovereignty in bold antagonism against papal 
aggression : 

"What earthly name to interrogatories 
Can task the free breath of a sacred king ? 
Thou canst not, cardinal, devise a name 
So slight, unworthy, and ridiculous. 
To charge me to an answer, as the pope. 



142 LECTURE FOURTH. 

Tell him this tale ; and from the mouth of England, 

Add thus much more, — that no Italian priest 

Shall tithe or toll in our dominions : 

But, as we under Heaven are supreme head ; 

So, under him, that great supremacy, 

Where we do reign, we will alone uphold, 

Without the assistance of a mortal hand : 

So tell the pope ; all reverence set apart. 

To him and his usurped authority." 

And wlien the King of France interposes — 
"Brother of England, you blaspheme in this," 
John retorts — 

"Though you, and all the kings of Christendom, 
Are led so grossly by this meddling priest. 
Dreading the curse that money may buy out ; 
And, by the merit of vile gold, dross, dust. 
Purchase corrupted pardon of a man. 
Who, in that sale, sells pardon from himself; 
Though you, and all the rest, so grossly led. 
This juggling witchcraft with revenue cherish; 
Yet I, alone, alone do me oppose 
Against the pope, and count his friends my foes." 

This resistance brought upon John the penalty of excom- 
munication, and upon the realm, in punishment of the 
sovereign, that more dreadful and extraordinary inflic- 
tion, the papal interdict. This penalty — the general 
effect of which was to stop all religious services — was a 
form of ecclesiastical punishment which, according to the 
authority of Eoman Catholic historians, was unknown in 
the early ages of the church, and did not come distinctly 
into use before the eleventh century. It is accounted for 
as an expedient resorted to for the purpose of counteract- 



THE REIGN OF KING JOHN. 143 



ing and controlling feudal tyranny. In this case the 
sentence of a general interdict over the whole of Eng- 
land was proclaimed; and the effects of it have been thus 
described : 

"As an ecclesiastical act^ the features which most 
struck the minds of the country people were, that the 
daily sacrifice ceased, the doors of the churches were shut 
against them; that the dead were carried outside the 
town-gates, and buried in ditches or roadsides, without 
prayer or priests' offices. The images of apostles and 
saints were taken down or veiled ; the frequent tinkle of 
the convent-bell no longer told the serf at the plough 
how the weary day was passing, or guided the traveller 
through the forest to a shelter for the night. Religion, 
wont to mix with and hallow each hour of the day, each 
action of life, was totally withdrawn. The state of the 
country resembled a raid of the Danes, or the days of old 
Saxon heathendom, before Augustine had set up the 
cross at Canterbury or holy men had penetrated the 
forest and the fen."* 

" Closed are the gates of every sacred place, 
Straight from the sun and tainted air's embrace, 
All sacred things are covered ; cheerful mom 
Grows sad as night : no seemly garb is worn, 
Nor is a face allowed to meet a face 
With natural smile of greeting. Bells are dumb ; 
Ditches are graves — funereal rights denied; 
And in the churchyard he must take his bride 
Who dares be wedded."-}- 

* Lives of the English Saints, No. 10, p. 32. Life of Stephen 
Langton. Hume's description of the Interdict has been often cited 
with praise by his admirers. W. B. E. 

f Wordsworth's Sonnet, — An Interdict. 



144 LECTURE FOURTH. 



The temper of the king was not controlled by this 
dismal condition of a Christian land; but, with a crime- 
fraught conscience^ the tyrant was affrighted by super- 
stitious terrors, and the fatal predictions of a popular 
soothsayer. The pope invoked the alliance of France to 
quell by invasion and the force of arms that resistance 
against which the mandates and penalties of Rome had 
proved unavailing. Under the dread of this danger, the 
mean and abject spirit of John sank to its lowest and 
worst estate. The crown of England, that which had 
decked the brow of Alfred and of the Confessor and of 
the Conqueror, was laid at the feet of Pandulph, the 
papal legate, and John surrendered his kingdom to re- 
ceive it back and hold it as the vassal and tributary 
of the pope. The infamy of John was completed 
and national degradation brought upon England. "The 
transaction,^^ says the Roman Catholic historian, "was 
certainly a disgraceful act;'^* and an English poet, in a 
higher strain of patriotic indignation, has said — 

"Lo! John self-stripped of his insignia; — crown, 
Sceptre and mantle, sword and ring, laid down 
At a proud Legate's feet ! The spears that line 
Baronial halls, the opprobrious insult feel. 
And angry Ocean roars a vain appeal."f 

After this came the third and last great struggle of 
the reign, in which the confederate barons wrested from 
the reluctant king the Great Charter of English rights — 
that sealed acknowledgment of ancient rights which is an 
epoch in the history of constitutional freedom. In that 



* Lingard, vol. iii. p. 32. 

f "Wordsworth's Sonnet on Papal Abuses, p. 354. 



tup: iiEiax of king JOHN. 145 



achievement, no one rendered more important services 
than Stephen Langton, — he whom Innocent the Third 
had, in fact, made th5 Primate of England. In the 
political struggle connected with the Charter, the pope 
was arrayed on the side of his vassal king and against 
the cause of English liberties; while Langton, true to 
his nativity as an Englishman, and to his station as the 
chief bishop of England, was the fearless defender of that 
Charter of which it has been said that — '^ If every subse- 
quent law were swept away, there would still remain the 
bold features which distinguish a free from a despotic 
monarchy/^ 

After a reign of conflict and confusion and disgrace, 
John dies a miserable and a suffering death; and the last 
words that ftJl upon his dying ear are the evil tidings of 
continued disaster. The. spirit of Arthur is avenged.* 

At the close of the tragedy, Shakspeare, with some dis- 
regard of chronological accuracy, brings back the nobles 
to their allegiance ; and then, with the voice of Falcon- 
bridge — the very embodiment of patriotism and loyalty — 
he raises the mind from the weakness and degradation of 
the reign to a sense of England's power and independ- 
ence. It is in a high strain of that national self-confi- 



* " In the chroniclers, we have manifold changes of fortune in the 
life of John, after Arthur of Brittany has fallen. In Shakspeare, 
Arthur is at once avenged. The heart-broken mother and her boy are 
not the only sufferers from double courses. The spirit of Constance is 
appeased by the fall of John, The Niobe of a Gothic age, who vainly 
thought to shield her child from so stern a destiny as that with which 
Apollo and Artemis pursued the daughter of Tantalus, may rest in 
peace." Historical Illustrations to C. Knight's Shakspeare, vol. i. p. 
78. W. B. R. 

10 



146 LECTURE FOTRTH. 



dence wMcli, thougli it may degenerate into national 
vanity or swell into intolerable national pride, is part of 
tlie power wliicli makes a people ^unconquerable, — it is in 
STicli a spirit that Falconbridge tells the young prince 
and the nobles — 

"This England never did, (nor never shall,) 
Lie at the proud foot of a conqueror, 
But when it first did help to wound itself. 
Now these her princes are come home again, 
Come the three corners of the world in arms. 
And we shall shock them : nought shall make us rue, 
If England to itself do rest but true." 

Let me add that these lines were composed by Shak- 
speare not long after that year in which the fonnidable 
invasion by the Spanish Armada was driven back in ruin 
from the shores of England. The poet's heart beat high 
as he beheld the banners of the ships of Spain hung out 
as trophies from the battlements of the Cathedral of 
-St. Paul's, when Queen Elizabeth, in the midst of a 
rejoicing people, went up to that metropolitan temple to 
give thanks to God for the safety of her realm. 



LECTURE Y.* 

Henry the Third and the Edwards passed over by Shakspeare — De 
Montfort's Rebellion — Growth of the Constitution — The Commons — 
Extent of parliamentary government — Our republica,n institutions — 
The highway of nations — The Plantagenet kings — Edward the 
Third and the Black Prince — Chaucer — AVar with France — Arnold's 
view — Southey — From Richard the Second the " Chronicle-Plays" 
continuous — The fifteenth century — King John and Henry tho 
Eighth, prologue and epilogue — Richard the Second strictly histo- 
rical — Character of the king — His previous career — Popular element 
in France and Flanders and England — Wat Tyler's Rebellion — Its 
effects — Revolt of the nobles — Opening of the tragedy — Norfolk and 
Bolingbroke — Exile — Character of Bolingbroke — Death of John of 
Gaunt — Moral degradation of the king — His misfortunes elevate 
him — Bolingbroke's return — Divine right of kings — Richard's de- 
position, imprisonment, and death. 

After King John, tlie next period of English his- 
tory which has been illustrated by Shakspeare' s historical 
plays is the reign of Richard the Second. The reign 
of King John belongs, it will be remembered, to the 
first years of the thirteenth century; that of Richard 
the Second closed the fourteenth; so that the inter- 
vening time was not a great deal less than two hun- 
dred years, — an interval of great importance for the 



* January 25th, 1847. 



148 LECTURE FIFTH. 



events tliat distinguislied it and for the progress of the 
Constitution, but less familiar, for the single reason, I 
believe, that the light of Shakspeare's mind has not illu- 
minated it for us. The reigns during that interval were 
few in number, for two of them were protracted to an un- 
common length, — ^half a century in one case, and more 
than that in another. The reigns which Shakspeare has 
passed over are those of Henry the Third and the first 
three of the Edwards. 

When, on the death of King John, his son Henry, in the 
tenth year of his age, was crowned King of England, the 
Earl of Pembroke, addressing his baronial peers, said, — 
'^We have persecuted the father for evil demeanour, and 
worthily : yet this young child, whom ye see before you, 
as he is in years tender, so he is innocent of his father's 
doings.'^ The appeal was not in vain. The young Plan- 
tagenet was set on the throne, enjoying the restored alle- 
giance of his barons ; but the regal power, thus fortified 
by returning loyalty, was also in the bonds of the G-reat 
Charter. The child-king grew to manhood, but not to the 
strength of manhood. Old abuses were revived, and the 
high spirit of the barons awoke again to resist them — by 
remonstrance, by opposition, and, at length, by open 
war. There was De Montfort, Earl of Leicester, at the 
head of the insurgent nobles, — he who, with his Oxford 
Parliament — the '"'- Mad Parliament," as the old historians 
called it — took the kingdom away from the sovereign, and 
gave it into the hands of Commissioners. There were 
the vicissitudes of civil war, — the king, at one time, a 
prisoner, and afterwards triumphant, and Leicester dead 
on the field of battle. "All the months of the year,'' 
says the witty church-historian, Thomas Fuller, " may in 



THE REIGN OP RICHARD THE SECOND. 149 



a manner be carved out of an April day, — ^hot, cold, dry, 
moist, fair, foul weather, being oft presented therein. 
Such was the character of King Henry the Third's life, 
certain only in uncertainty; sorrowful, successful; in 
plenty, in penury; in wealth, in want; conquered, con- 
queror."* 

This period of English annals is too remote, and the 
prominent characters in it are too dimly represented, for 
us to feel that lively interest which is produced by the 
biographical knowledge of historic personages. The study 
of it is, however, important, as showing the growth of the 
nation, and the steady and gradual progress of the Con- 
stitution. In looking back over that progress, one cannot 
help being struck with the small and obscure beginnings 
of great political institutions, and thinking how uncon- 
scious the actors must have been of the magnitude of 
that futurity, which was to follow their deeds. In this 
reign of Henry the Third, after Simon de Montfort, at 
the head of the baronial confederacy, had defeated his 
king in open battle, acting as sovereign of the kingdom, 
he summoned the cities and boroughs to send members to 
Parliament. When he cast that seed into the soil of his 
country, how little did he dream of the mighty and per- 
petual germination that it would disclose in after times ! 
How little could he have thought, that he was laying the 
foundation of the popular house of the British Parlia- 
ment; and, indeed, not only of the English House of Com- 
mons, but the popular representative legislatures of the 
Anglo-American republics in another continent ! Men 
cannot foresee the consequences of such deeds; and, 

* Church History of Britain, vol. i. p. 369. 



160 LECTURE FIFTH. 



indeed; the most enduring and happiest political institu- 
tions are those which have not grown up in the sight of 
one generation of men, but during the lapse of ages have 
risen higher and higher, and spread their branches on 
every side.* In examining the history of a country, you 
see the national life as it develops itself, first in one 
change, then in another • sometimes by regular and tran- 
quil alterations, sometimes by violence, and, it may be, 
bloodshed ; but ever, when the growth is most healthful, 
it is by a due course of expansion, rather than by wilful 
and violent changes. Thus, the steps which De Montfort 
took when he summoned the representation of the towns, 
made a path which seemed slight; but it was destined, in 
the providential government of the world, to become the 
great highway on which there should move, not only the 
kingly Commonwealth of England, but the republican 
Commonwealth of America. Indeed, I find myself bor- 
rowing here partly the language of a very happy illustra- 
tion of gradual changes of government : — " New political 
institutions,^^ it has been well said, " originate just as a 
path is made in the field. The fii*st person who crosses 
the grass, treads it down. The mass of elastic verdure 
immediately rises up again; nevertheless, some few of the 
more limber stalks and slender blades are bruised and 
crushed, and continue prostrate on the ground ; yet so 
slight is the impression made upon the herbage, that the 
clearest eyesight can hardly discover the harm. After 
the first passenger, other people follow; and, within a little 
while, marks of their footsteps begin to be perceivable. 
Nobody noticed the first footsteps. At what period they 

* De Maistre,Essai surle principe generateur des ConstitutionsPolitiques. 



THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE SECOND. 



became visible, nobody can recollect. But now, there the 
footsteps are, the grass has changed its colour, the depres- 
sions are distinct, and they direct other wayfarers to follow 
the same line. 

"Not long afterwards, bits and patches of the soil, 
where, very recently, the grass was only flattened and 
trodden down, are now worn quite bare. You see the 
naked earth; the roots of the grass are dried, the grass is 
killed — it springs up no more; and then the bare places 
gradually and gradually extend till the brown devours the 
intervening green : the bare worn places join one another, 
all the green between them is destroyed, the continuous 
path is formed. 

"But the path does not continue single. One passen- 
ger treads upon the bounding grass to suit his conve- 
nience ; another wantonly ; a third for want of thought ; 
more footsteps, more bare places. Tracks enlarge the 
path on either side ; and these means of transit invite so 
many passengers, that they break down the hedges for 
their further accommodation without waiting to ask the 
owner's leave. The trespass has received the sanction of 
usage ; and the law, however unwillingly, is compelled to 
pronounce the judgment, that a public right of way has 
been acquired, which can never more be denied or 
closed.^'* 

The right of way in the government was opened for 
the people during the inglorious reign of Henry the 
Third, — opened never to be closed; and when, in the 
next reign, Edward the First entered on his brilliant 
career of conquest, while he was consolidating his 

•* Palgrave's Merchant and Friar, p. 89. 



152 LECTURE I'IFTII. 



kingdom by the reduction of Wales, the cause of consti- 
tutional freedom was moving onward. The movement 
did not stop during the degenerate rule of the second 
Edward, — a reign which was signalized by two battles, a 
victory and a defeat ; of which it has been strangely but 
truly said, that the victory should be lamented by Eng- 
land as a national judgment, and the defeat celebrated as 
a national festival. The victory was over the Irish, and 
the government of Ireland is to this day England's 
plague; and the defeat by the Scots at Bannockburn 
left Scotland independent, to be united to England in due 
course of time by peaceful treaty. After an opprobrious 
reign, domestic treachery precipitated the ruin of Edward 
the Second, — the first of the kings of England who died 
discrowned. In that fine ode which the poet Gray com- 
posed, as if spoken by a Welsh bard addressing Edward 
the Eirst, at the time of his invasion of Wales, and de- 
nouncing, in prophetic voice, the sorrows of his posterity, 
there is, perhaps, no more startling or impressive passage 
than that in which, foretelling the murder of his son, he 
bids him — 

" Mark the year and mark the night, 
When Severn shall re-echo, with aflfright, 
The shrieks of death through Berkeley's roof that ring, 
Shrieks of an agonizing king."* 

The splendid fifty years' reign of Edward the Third 
raised the national spirit of England to a higher point 
than it had yet attained. It was an era in English his- 
tory of expanding and aspiring nationality. The sove- 
reign's high ambition of adding the crown of France to 

* Gray's Bard. Poetical Works, p. 170, Reed's Edition. 



THE KEIGN OF RICHARD THE SECOND. 



that of England^ carried along with it the hearts of his 
nobles and his people. The spirit of the nation was filled 
with enthusiasm by two of the most famous of England's 
victories, achieved by her two champions, the king him- 
self and his warlike son, Edward, the Black Prince. 
The peaceful splendour of the reign equalled its martial 
glory. There was the pride and magnificence of chivalry, 
when chivalry had not yet declined to mere formal pomp 
and pageantry. The generous spirit and the intellectual 
activity of the times were displayed in the patronage of 
painting and the other fine arts, and architectural piles 
arose to perpetuate, with church and castle, the memory 
of an illustrious era. The character of the times was 
finely shown, too, in the glorious outburst of English 
poetiy, when the first of the great English poets, Geofi"rey 
Chaucer, displayed the power of English imagination and 
of the English language in a series of poems, which, in 
variety of feeling and scope of subject, are surpassed only 
by the productions of Shakspeare. 

Such was the bright side of the reign of the third 
Edward. But, looking even at the darker side, there 
was good evolving out of its difiicultics. War is not a 
game to be played at with ivory counters, and the war 
with France was a costly one, ^^ whereby,'^ says an old 
historian, '^our nation became exceedingly proud, and 
exceedingly poor.'^ The king needed money for his 
wars, but that very necessity proved a cause of the 
steady progress of the constitutional rights and liberties 
of the nation. It is to this period of English history 
that Arnold, in his history of Kome, alludes, in a 
passage of admirable wisdom on the growth of constitu- 
tional freedom. Spealring of the slow process by which 



154 LECTURE FIPTH. 



the Roman plebeians rose to the political level of their 
patrician fellow-citizens, he says : — " So it is, that all 
things come best in their season ; that political power is 
most happily exercised by a people, when it has not been 
given to them prematurely; that is, before, in the natural 
progress of things, they feel they want it. Security for 
person and property enables a nation to grow without 
interruption : in contending for this, a people's sense of 
law and right is wholesomely exercised. Meantime, 
national prosperity increases, and brings with it an in- 
crease of intelligence, till other and more necessary wants 
being satisfied, men awaken to the highest earthly desire 
of the ripened mind — the desire of taking an active share 
in the great work of government. The Koman Commons 
abandoned the highest magistracies to the Patricians for 
a period of many years ; but they continued to increase 
in prosperity and influence ; and what their fathers had 
wisely yielded, their sons in the fulness of time acquired. 
So the English House of Commons, in the reign of Ed- 
ward the Third, decKned to interfere in questions of peace 
and war as being too high for them to compass; but they 
would not allow the crown to take their money without 
their own consent; and so the nation grew, and the influ- 
ence of the House of Commons grew along with it, till 
that House has become the great and predominant power 
in the British Constitution.^'* 

The closing days of Edward's long and brilliant reign 
were clouded over. ^'Never,'^ writes Southey, ^^was 
there a king in whose history the will of Providence may 
seem to have been more clearly manifested : so greatly 

* History of Rome, vol. i. p. 343. 



THE REIGN OF RICnARD THE SECOND. 155 



had his victories exceeded all hounds of reasonahle hope, 
so much had his reverses surpassed all reasonahle appre- 
hension ! Well might Edward have exclaimed with the 
preacher ' that all is vanity/ when he had survived the 
wife of his bosom, the son of his youth and of his proudest 
and dearest hopes, his prosperity, his popularity, the re- 
spect of his chiefs, and the love of his people ; for, after 
the loss of his son, his moral and intellectual strength 
gave way, and he fell under subjection to an artful and 
rapacious woman. In this, however, posterity has been 
just, that it has judged of him, not by the failure of his 
fortunes and the weakness of his latter days, but by the 
general tenor and the great and abiding consequences of 
his long and glorious reign/' 

The succeeding reign of Richard the Second brings us 
to another of those periods of English history, which are 
illustrated by Shakspeare's historical plays; and, hence- 
forward, the dramatic illustration will be found to con^ 
tinue uninterrupted during well-nigh a century, and 
during seven consecutive reigns. Of the ten ^' Chronicle- 
Plays'' which Shakspeare composed from the annals of 
his country, eight are devoted to one grand period, and 
that period is thus illustrated with extraordinary com- 
pleteness. It is the time between the reign of Richard 
the Second and Richard the Third, comprehending the 
intermediate reigns of the fourth, fifth, and sixth Hen- 
ries, and the fourth and fifth Edwards. The subject of 
this era is the great civil conflict between the two branches 
of the Plantagenet family, the houses of Lancaster and 
York; and Shakspeare has represented this struggle from 
its earliest beginning down to the final catastrophe upon 
Bosworth Field. He has traced the contest back to its 



156 LECTURE FIFTH. 



primal cause — to the very elements of its moral origin ; 
and lias tlien followed it onward througli all its vicissi- 
tudes — through the multiform retribution with which, by 
turns, the sins of each party were visited ; and, marking 
the ebb and flow of the bloody tide of civil war, he has 
traced its course to the day when the sceptre of England 
passed forever from the race of the Plantagenets. 

Shakspeare has treated this large historical theme — 
England's great business in the fifteenth century — in a 
series of eight plays so closely connected, so interwoven 
with each other, following one another in so close and 
express succession, that they may be regarded as the eight 
acts of one grand tragedy — ^the drama of the historic life 
of very near a century. You will observe, therefore, that 
Shakspeare has taken one great era of English history, 
and that, too, in its most ample form, in its fullest extent, 
and he has completed the dramatic picture of it; the work 
is entire — it is finished. Looking, as we are apt to do, at 
these '^Chronicle-Plays'' separately, we do not appreciate 
the magnitude of the poet's achievement in the depart- 
ment of history; and it is only by taking a comprehensive 
view, and contemplating the unity of this series of plays, 
that we learn the grandeur of the theme and the sublimity 
of the genius which accomplished it. The tragedy of 
Richard the Second, the two parts of Henry the Fourth, 
Henry the Fifth, the three parts of Henry the Sixth, and 
the tragedy of Richard the Third constitute, in truth, 07ie 
splendid drama, unparalleled, nay, unapproached, in all 
imaginative literature. The subject of it maybe described 
as the decline and fall of the Plantagenet dynasty — the 
downfall of the dominion which had endured during an 
eventful period of three hundred and fifty years. The two 



THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE SECOND. 167 



historical plays wticli stand detaclied from this series — 
"King John'^ and '^ Henry the Eighth'^ — may be brought 
into relation with it by considering King John, as Schlegel 
proposes, a kind of prologue to the series, inasmuch as it 
represents an earlier period with all the varied elements 
of the early mediaeval times ; and, on the other hand, by 
regarding Henry the Eighth as an epilogue, representing 
the beginning of the new. political and social condition of 
England in modern times. We have thus all these 
^' Chronicle -Plays,'^ constituting one great historical 
poem, in which the poet's imagination, taking the sub- 
ject from the annals of his country, has created this life- 
like spectacle of the fortunes of kings and princes — their 
glories and their woes — their high estate and the deep 
precipitation from it — the splendour and the pride of 
their lives, and the tragic misery of their deaths ; and, 
with air this, the weal and welfare of the nation, and its 
disasters and chastisement ; and, surely, never was there 
such wonderful fulfilment of the wished-for vision of Mil- 
ton when, in the ^'Penseroso,'' he exclaims — • 

"Let gorgeous Tragedy, 
With sceptered pall, come sweeping by, 
Presenting Thebes, or Pelops' line, 
Or the tale of Troy divine. 
Or what, (though rare,) of later age 
Ennobled hath the buskin'd stage." 

I have spoken of these historical plays as forming a con- 
nected series, and giving a continuous dramatic represen- 
tation of an era of English history ; it is, however, also to 
be borne in mind that each one of them is complete in 
itself, and has its own dramatic unity. I shall have occa- 
Bion to use them in regular succession, and to show with 



168 LECTURE FIFTH. 



what consummate skill, Shakspeare kas linked these plays 
together — one the sequel to the other. It is when we 
contemplate them as the parts of one great drama, that 
we are most deeply impressed with their historical value 
and with the poet-historian's power; for it is then that 
we are enabled to behold the whole revolution of the 
wheel of kingly fortune, as it makes its large circuit 
through the space of near a century; it is then that we 
can see, in what else seems so chanceful, the hand that 
turns the wheel of fortune, and learn the workings of 
that even-handed justice, which sends its retribution, if 
not promptly to the guilty, slowly, but certainly, to the 
second and third generations of the guilty. Taking these 
plays as one ample poem, I know not where else to look 
for such varied and splendid teaching of the lessons of 
retributive justice. We shall see how the firmly-seated 
dynasty of the Plantagenets — fortified by long possession 
and its lineage from the Norman Conqueror — is forced by 
the frailties of the second Richard from the due course of 
hereditary succession; we shall see the Lancastrian usur- 
pation first established with the forms, at least, of law, 
then raised to the highest glory of the monarchy by Henry 
the Fifth's splendid career of foreign conquest, and then, 
by the bloody strife of the Roses, utterly cast down. We 
shall afterwards follow the victorious progress of the house 
of York onward to the darkening of their fortunes, to the 
secret slaughter of the child-king, Edward the Fifth, and 
the more open death, in the face of the ofi'ended heavens 
— the soldier's death — of the last of the Plantagenets on 
Bosworth Field. 

In proceeding to that period of English history which 
is illustrated by the tragedy of Richard the Second, let 



THE REIGN OF IlICnARD THE SECOND. 159 



me advert to the fact that^ in this play, Shakspeare has 
treated history in a manner widely different from that in 
King John. In forming a drama out of the historical 
events of the reign of King John, the poet had no choice 
but to use a large liberty with the actual succession of 
these events, separated as they were in point of time, and 
to create a dramatic unity, by which the beginning and 
the close of the reign should be morally connected : it was 
necessary, too, to mould the history in such a way as to 
invent the dramatic action for the personages of the play. 
Now in Richard the Second the historical materials were 
very different : the history grows out of Richard's cha- 
racter; indeed, his character is the history, so that the 
poet is the historian; because, in presenting character, 
which is essential in dramatic poetry, he is, at the same 
time, telling the history. In this case, therefore, the poet 
follows the footsteps of the chronicler, — ^the play and the 
chronicle are in the same path. In King John, one of 
the most important, and certainly the noblest person of 
the play, Philip Falconbridge, is an imaginary character, 
most happily created and wisely used for the purposes of 
history as well as of the drama. But in Richard the 
Second there is mo imaginary character; all the person- 
ages are strictly and actually historical. The tragedy of 
King John comprehended the whole of the reign — the 
events of sixteen years; in Richard the Second, Shak- 
speare has confined the drama to the close of the reign, 
— only a little more than one year out of the twenty-two 
during which Richard occupied the throne. The whole 
of this previous portion of the reign is omitted, and we 
know it in the play only by its results, and the retrospect 
that is occasionally given. 



160 LECTURE FIFTH. 



The opening of the tragedy of Richard the Second dis- 
plays the various elements which are to be wrought to the 
great historical issues of the time ; and it shows the con- 
dition of the realm after the lapse of about twenty years 
of Richard's sway. We see at once the state distracted 
by a turbulent and proud nobility, and division and dis- 
cord in the royal family. Somewhat more gradually, the 
poet brings into view the character of the monarch, beneath 
the lofty majesty of whose demeanour, which first strikes 
the mind, we soon discover the fickle, arbitrary temper and 
the unreal strength of that pride which is to work out its 
own ruin in a career of folly and dissimulation and ty- 
ranny. In the play, Richard comes on the scene such a 
man as the previous portion of his life had made him ; 
and to that previous period we must therefore look back 
in order to understand his character and his history. We 
must look there to discover what it waS; or what causes 
combined to fill him with such pride ; to learn what out- 
ward influences had worked upon his natural disposition 
so as to make him at once so haughty and so helpless. 
Refore we proceed to the study of the tragic chastisement 
of his vices and his frailties, we must needs look at the 
origin and growth of that tyrannic pride, which rendered 
him so fit a subject to illustrate the retributive and 
chastening influences, which are the high theme of 
tragedy. 

Richard the Second, when he succeeded to his grand- 
father, Edwai-d the Third, was a boy of about eleven 
years of age, — that critical time of life when the inno- 
cence and purity of childhood are gone. He succeeded to a 
reign which, during the long term of fifty years, had been 
triumphant abroad and unresisted at home; and the 



THE REIQN OF RICHARD THE SECOND. 161 



strength and glory of that reign were well fitted to 
fill the mind of the boy-king with the belief that the 
throne was impregnable, and the sceptre had super- 
human might. This pride may well have been height- 
ened, too, by the ancestral feeling inspired by the heroic 
character and the martial prowess of his father, Edward, 
the Black Prince, who, unhappily for his son, had died 
before the succession reached him. There was every 
thing in Richard's thoughts of the past to fire his pride ; 
and, when he mounted the throne, he felt that it was up- 
held, not only by the moral influences of a nation's love 
for the memory of his forefathers, but also by the counsel 
and the power of the surviving sons of Edward the Third, 
Lancaster and Gloucester and York ; and the boy little 
dreamed that the multitude of his uncles was to prove one 
of the miseries of his reign, and that, at last, a kinsman's 
hand was to thrust him from the throne, and to a prison, 
and to his grave. He could not see how much of danger- 
ous ambition lurked in the hearts of his uncles; nor could 
he understand that, while the last king had bequeathed to 
him and to his people the glory of his foreign conquests, 
there was the legacy, too, of the cost of conquest and mili- 
tary renown ; and that, in his day, the poetry of war was 
to be followed by that which is its inevitable sequel, the 
prose of debt and taxes and extortion. 

It was Richard's fate to live in times when his pomp and 
pride became doubly dangerous. In the latter part of the 
fourteenth century a change was coming over the spirit of 
the people of Europe : there were indications, not to be mis- 
taken, that government was no longer to be an afiair of kings 
and nobles only, but the popular element was beginning 
to manifest itself, and not in England alone, but in other 
11 



162 LECTURE FIFTH. 



lands. It is a fact in European history worthy of careful 
study, that, at the time I am referring to, there was a 
contemporaneous movement of the lower classes — of the 
body of the people — in various countries. France felt it, 
and Flanders and England. The stern slavery under the 
feudal system was relaxing ; the voice of the serf, who so 
long in silence had endured his bondage, was at length 
heard ; the spirit of freedom, which heretofore had ani- 
mated only the noble and the high-born, was now inflam- 
ing the hearts of those who, under the bonds of villain- 
service, had been part of the ownership of the soil, like a 
"rooted tree or stone earth-bound. '^ There was an almost 
simultaneous rising of the lower orders of the people; and 
not being confined to any one country, it is to be explained 
only by general and, doubtless, various causes affecting 
European society and government at large. It would 
carry me beyond my subject were I to attempt to make 
any inquiry into these causes. It so happened that when 
the great body of the people was gradually rising in the 
scale of civilization, the pressure on them was increased ; 
they rose up under it to assert their natural rights, or 
what may better be called, their simplest civic rights. 
The popular insurrections in the Flemish towns, in Paris, 
and in some of the French provinces, and in England, 
were attended with tumult and bloodshed. Long-con- 
tinued and heartless neglect and oppression had engen- 
dered fierce hatred of the former masters, and political 
enfranchisement was sought in the wild spirit of revenge; 
so true is it, that " the great and hardest problem of poli- 
tical wisdom is, to prevent any part of society from be- 
coming so socially degraded by poverty, that their political 
enfranchisement becomes dangerous or even mischievous.'* 



THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE SECOND. 



This danger was encountered by tlie young King 
Richard in the early part of his reign; and I have 
referred to it, because the success with which it was 
quelled was well fitted to aggravate that pride, the forma- 
tion of which in his character I proposed to trace. 
Richard was but sixteen years of age, when the tran- 
quillity of his kingdom was broken by that extensive and 
formidable insurrection, w:hich, from the name of its 
leader, is called " Wat Tyler's Rebellion.^^ The oppres- 
sion of the serfs, and the exactions under which the com- 
mon people were suffering, had produced a high state of 
popular exasperation. Little was needed to cause an out- 
break against the government. This natural sense of 
injury in the minds of the people was further excited and 
misguided by a seditious and fanatic priest — John Ball — 
who went about the country teaching revolutionary les- 
sons in their most destmctive forms — in sermons, with the 
proverb, in doggerel verse, for his text — 

"When Adam delved and Ev^ span. 
Who was then the gentleman V 

The insurgents assembled in the neighbouring coun- 
ties, and came up to London sixty thousand strong; 
they seized the Tower, they threw open the prison-doors, 
destroyed the palace of the Duke of Lancaster, put to 
death many of the citizens who attempted to withstand 
them, and led the Primate of England to execution. It 
was a vast and triumphant riot ; but, in the midst of it, 
with an intrepidity worthy of the son of an heroic father, 
the young king — the manly boy — rode into the metropo- 
lis, attended by only sixty horsemen, to meet and con- 
ciliate the multitude of his malecontent subjects assembled 



164 LECTURE FIFTH. 



by thousands and flushed with the sudden success of their 
revolt. As soon as the insurgents beheld their leader 
struck down^ they were won back again to their alle- 
giance, it would seem, by the mere presence of their 
youthful sovereign -, — and what could have occurred more 
fitted to feed the pride of such a heart as his, than the 
thought that he possessed such power over the hearts of 
thousands of his incensed and turbulent people ? It made 
him proud of himself, and still more proud of the might 
of royalty. 

The suppression of Wat Tyler's rebellion was suc- 
ceeded by a confused and uncertain period of intrigue 
and conspiracy and crime. The king surrounded himself 
with unworthy favourites, who flattered him to his ruin. 
He gave himself to a career of lavish expenditure, of 
wanton misrule, and despotic pride. His kinsmen and 
his uncles became odious to him, and he to them. In 
Parliament, dethronement and exile were openly spoken 
of, and the fate of his great grandsire, Edward the 
Second, darkly hinted at. The discontented nobility 
began to confer and confederate against the king; and 
his own uncle, the Duke of Gloucester, placed himself at 
the head of one of the hostile factions. The king was 
beset with perils, but, what was worse, he was beset with 
evil counsellors, and his own evil passions. Flattery and 
self-indulgence had been working their mischief on his 
nature, and he was on the downward path of degeneracy. 
He could not now meet his foes as, when a boy, he went 
forth to meet sixty thousand infuriated rebels, and, with 
open intrepidity, overawe and subdue them. The boy 
was brave because he was innocent ; but now, dark coun- 
sels of revenge and treachery seemed good to him, and 



THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE SECOND. 165 



poison and assassination were thought surer and easier 
means, by whicli a king could sweep his enemies from off 
the earth. The Duke of Gloucester was hurried away to 
a distant prison, where, mysteriously, he died a death of 
violence; and henceforth the guilt, which the king has 
added to his frailties and his follies, is to haunt his life to 
its close. Retribution, it is said, walks with a foot of 
velvet, and strikes with a hand of steel; and now its 
noiseless steps are towards this king, and its hand up- 
lifted. 

It is at this point of his reign and of his character that 
Shakspeare brings Richard the Second before us. The 
quarrel between the son of the Duke of Lancaster, Henry 
Hereford, called Bolingbroke, and Thomas Mowbray, Earl 
of Norfolk, with which the play opens, is to be decided, 
as the king determines, by the wager of battle, the single 
combat of the two noblemen — that ancient feudal form of 
trial, in which it was supposed Heaven would mark the 
righteous party by giving him the victory. The lists at 
Coventry are made ready for the combat ; the combatants 
appear with their heralds and in all the pomp of chivalry, 
and in the presence of the king and many of the nobles. 
The merits of this controversy between Bolingbroke and 
Mowbray are involved in the obscurity which covers the 
intrigues and half-treasonable plots of this reign. It was 
one of those doubtful cases in which neither the accusa- 
tion nor the defence admitted of notorious proof; and, 
therefore, according to the feudal jurisprudence, the trial 
of combat was awarded, and the Almighty was to be the 
judge, His will being, as it was believed, manifested by 
the result. To that judgment, Richard, though he 
awarded the trial, is not willing to commit it ; and he 



166 LECTURE FIFTH. 



interposes the decree of his mortal majesty at the last 
moment, when the trumpets have sounded, and the com- 
batants are arrayed in complete armour, and, upon their 
armed steeds, are setting forward to encounter each other 
in deadly conflict. At that instant, the king throws down 
his warder — the truncheon of command — as a signal to 
prevent the combat. Whether this was caprice or a 
deeper stroke of policy and dissimulation, the reasons of 
the king seem hollow and insincere ; and, as he professes 
his desire to spare the shedding of such blood as flowed 
in the veins of the high-born combatants, and to save the 
kingdom from the feuds of civil warfare that might ensue, 
we cannot help looking forward in the history, and think- 
ing that the throwing down of the king's warder in the 
lists at Coventry may be considered the prelude to that 
fierce struggle between the houses of York and Lancaster, 
which distracted England during the greater part of half 
a century, and in which the best blood of the nation was 
poured out like water. The act of the king, on this occa- 
sion, was the beginning of a series of events, which close 
only with the battle of Bosworth Field ; and, if his pro- 
fessions were insincere, and his decree tyrannical, there 
was fearful retribution in the future, when, in consequence 
of what followed this event, the nation suffered thirty 
years of civil war, and four kings perished by violent 
deaths. 

The judgment which the king pronounced is arbitrary; 
for, instead of deciding between the parties, there is the 
easier tyranny of compromise by inflicting the penalty of 
guilt upon both of them. It is arbitrary, too, in the pro- 
portions of the penalty. Norfolk is banished for life, and 
Bolingbroke for the term of ten years, which is afterwards, 



THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE SECOND. 167 



in the same arbitrary temper, reduced to six years. It is 
not this inequality alone that creates a sympathy with 
Norfolk. We see Bolingbroke coming to the combat with 
a spirit that seems to exult chiefly in the consciousness of 
his strength, — "As confident/' he boasts, "as is the fal- 
con's flight against a bird." There is a deeper feeling in 
the spirit with which Mowbray meets the accusation, and 
confronts his adversary : 

" However Heaven or fortune cast my lot, 
There lives or dies, true to King Richard's throne, 
A loyal, just, and upright gentleman. 
Never did captive with a freer heart 
Cast off his chains of bondage, and embrace 
His golden, uncontrolled enfranchisement. 
More than my dancing soul doth celebrate 
This feast of battle with mine adversary. 
Most mighty liege, and my companion peers. 
Take from my mouth the wish of happy years : 
As gentle and as jocund, as to jest, 
Go I to fight. Truth hath a quiet breast." 

This does, indeed, sound like the voice of truth; it does 
seem the utterance of " a loyal, just, and upright gentle- 
man." Our pity for him, as an injured man, is deepened, 
when he replies so meekly, yet so feelingly, in that beau- 
tiful and pathetic lament for his perpetual exile : 

"A heavy sentence, my most sovereign liege. 
And all unlocked for from your highness' mouth; 
A dearer merit, not so deep a maim. 
As to be cast forth in the common air, 
Have I deserved at your highness' hand. 
The language I have learned these forty years. 
My native English, now I must forego : 
And now my tongue's use is to me no more 
Than an unstringed viol, or a harp. 



168 LECTURE FIFTH. 



Or like a cunning instrument eased up, 

Or, being open, put into his hands 

That knows no touch to tune the harmony. 

Within my mouth you have engaoled my tongue. 

Doubly portcullised with my teeth and lips ; 

And dull, unfeeling, barren ignorance 

Is made my gaoler to attend on me. 

I am too old to fawn upon a nurse, 

Too far in years to be a pupil now ; 

What is thy sentence, then, but speechless death, 

Which robs my tongue from breathing native breath ?" 

When the Duke of Lancaster, old John of Graunt, 
strives to reconcile his son to his shorter exile by telling 
him — 

" The sullen passage of thy weary steps 
Esteem a foil, wherein thou art to set 
The precious jewel of thy home-return," 

Bolingbroke replies in that fine and familiar strain of 
poetry — 

" Oh ! who can hold a fire in his hand. 
By thinking on the frosty Caucasus ? 
Or cloy the hungry edge of appetite 
By bare imagination of a feast ? 
Or wallow naked in December snow, 
By thinking on fantastic summer's heat ? 
Oh, no ! the apprehension of the good 
Gives but the greater feeling to the worse." 

This complaint comes to us with less of real pathos 
than the piteous lament of Norfolk. It is later in the 
drama — just at the time that Bolingbroke returns from 
his unfinished exile, and with the disloyal purpose of 
thrusting Richard from his throne and seizing the sceptre 



THE REIQN OP RICHARD THE SECOND. 169 



for himself — that we are told the story of what remained 
of the career of Norfolk : 

*' Many a time hath banished Norfolk fought 
For Jesu Christ; in glorious Christian field 
Streaming the ensign of the Christian cross. 
Against black pagans, Turks, and Saracens : 
And, toiled with works of war, retired himself 
To Italy; and there, at Venice, gave 
His body to that pleasant country's earth. 
And his pure soul unto his captain Christ, 
Under whose colours he had fought so long." 

No sooner is Bolingbroke banished than, as Shakspeare 
discloses the historical truth, we perceive that it was 
timid suspicion and jealousy in the breast of Richard, 
that prompted the sentence against his kinsman. The 
popular feeling, which the exile courted and won, as he 
went away, did not escape the notice of the king and his 
favourites : 

" Ourself and Bushy, Bagot here, and Green, 
Observed his courtship to the common people ; — 
How he did seem to dive into their hearts. 
With humble and familiar courtesy ; 
What reverence he did throw away on slaves. 
Wooing poor craftsmen with the craft of smiles. 
And patient underbearing of his fortune. 
As 'twere to banish their affects with him. 
Off goes his bonnet to an oyster- wench ; 
A brace of draymen bid — God speed him well, 
And had the tribute of his supple knee. 
With — * Thanks, my countrymen, my loving friends !' 
As were our England in reversion his. 
And he our subjects' next degree in hope." 

Happy would it have been for the frail and feeble 
Richard if, instead of letting the affections of his people 



170 LECTURE FIFTH. 



be won away from liiin by tbe arts of a demagogue, he 
bad secured tbem by bonourable means and a dutiful 
soyereignty, to be at once tbe prop and tbe pride of bis 
throne. Relieved from restraints and apprehensions of 
Bolingbroke's presence, the king precipitates himself still 
faster on his downward career of folly and crime. The 
wasteful pomp and pleasures of his court bring new temp- 
tations to tyrannous rapacity, and the recklessness of his 
character is further displayed, when, with fitful energy, 
he resolves to conduct the war against his rebel subjects 
in Ireland : 

""We will ourself in person to this war. 
And, for our coffers, Trith too great a court, 
And liberal largess, are grown somewhat light, 
"We are enforced to farm our royal realm ; 
The revenue whereof shall furnish us 
For our affairs in hand : if that come short, 
Our substitutes at home shall have blank charters; 
Whereto, when they shall know what men are rich, 
They shall subscribe them for large sums of gold, 
And send them after to supply our wants." 

A long-continued course of self-indulgence, together with 
the flattery of his minions, hardens the heart of King 
Richard more and more ; and when he is told that his 
uncle, old John of Gaunt, ^^time-honoured Lancaster," is 
"grievous sick," the spendthrift king exclaims, with utter 
and indecent heartlessness — 

" Now put it. Heaven, in his physician's mind 
To help him to his grave immediately ! 
The lining of his coffers shall make coats 
To deck our soldiers for these Irish wars. 
Come, gentlemen, let's all go visit him : 
Pray God, we may make haste, and come too late." 



THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE SECOND. 171 



The death scene of John of Gaunt is a dramatic inven- 
tion, but Shakspeare has made an admirable historical use 
of it, by putting into the mouth of Lancaster, not only a 
dying man's prophecy of the ruin that is to follow Rich- 
ard's riotous misrule, but also one of those magnificent 
poetic eulogies on England, by which the poet has fostered 
the national feeling of his countrymen. The misgovern- 
ment in Richard's reign grieves the spirit of the dying 
Lancaster ; because, remembering the splendour and the 
strength of his father's reign, he thinks of that small 
island England, as — 

" This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle, 
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars, 
This other Eden, demi-paradise ; 
This fortress, built by nature for herself, 
Against infection and the hand of war; 
This happy breed of men, this little world ; 
This precious stone, set in the silver sea, 
Which serves it in the oflB.ce of a wall, 
Or as a moat defensive to a house. 
Against the envy of less happier lands ; 
This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England." 

The remonstrance and the warnings of his dying uncle 
are of no avail to stop the headlong course of the king; 
they serve but to exasperate his royal pride. Imme- 
diately on Lancaster's death, Richard, reckless of law 
and right, seized upon his estates — the patrimony of the 
banished Bolingbroke, who, by his father's death, was 
now Duke of Lancaster. When this last tyranny is per- 
petrated, the warning voice of the Duke of York, the 
gentlest of Richard's uncles — the last surviving son of 
Edward the Third — is raised, and he strives to bring the 
king to a better mind by the memory of his father : 



172 LECTURE FIFTH. 



" I am the last of noble Edward's sons, 
Of whom thy father, prince of Wales, was first; 
In war was never lion raged more fierce. 
In peace was never gentle lamb more mild, 
Than was that young and princely gentleman : 
His face thou hast, for even so looked he, 
Accomplished with the number of thy hours ; 
But when he frowned, it was against the French, 
And not against his friends ; his noble hand 
Did win what he did spend, and spent not that, 
Which his triumphant father's hand had won : 
His hands were guilty of no kindred's blood, 
But bloody with the enemies of his kin." 

York warns the king, moreover, that, by the lawless 
seizure of Hereford's patrimony, lie plucks a thousand 
dangers on his head, and loses a thousand well-disposed 
hearts. But the poison of flattery and of criminal self- 
indulgence, and the demoralizing irresponsibility of 
power, have wrought their mischief so deep into the 
soul of Eichard, that neither rebuke nor kindly admoni- 
tion, nor the fear of impending evil, can help him. He 
is doomed — nothing can save his sceptre or his life. 

We have thus far followed, as Shakspeare and the 
chroniclers have traced it, the downward progress of 
Kichard the Second, until we behold him reduced to that 
pitch of moral degradation, which, in this tragedy, is 
shown with such matchless impartiality. Morally, the 
king is to be sunk no lower ; and let us now see how the 
poet-historian, with equal truth and with the large charity 
of a great poet's heart, raises him up again, not, indeed, 
to his primal power, but to our sympathy and pity. The 
heart, which had been hardened by flattery and the luxuries 
of arbitrary force, is to be softened ; the sleeping human- 
ity in his character is to be awakened; his dead con- 



THE REIGN OP RICHARD THE SECOND. 173 



science to be brought to life ; and all this, wMcli neither 
fear nor reproof nor kindness could do, is to be effected 
by what has been finely called " the power and divinity 
of suffering.''* This is the very theme of tragedy; the 
change in Richard's character, or rather the development 
of those better elements in it which, in prosperity, were 
well-nigh utterly perishing, came from the chastisement 
^)f affliction; how it came, is shown by Shakspeare.in this 
drama, in which he fulfils at once the high functions of 
poet, historian, and moralist. 

The king hastens back from Ireland, because the ba- 
nished Bolingbroke, regardless of his sentence, has re- 
turned to England. He has landed at Ravenspurg, his 
professed purpose being simply to claim his patrimony, 
but every step he takes is a step towards the possession 
of the throne. The king has returned to meet a great 
and growing danger — the magnitude of it making it at 
once awful but shadowy to his mind. He faces the 
danger, not with a wise or heroic self-confidence, for that 
he never possessed, unless it was in his youth, when he 
met the insurgents in London. He is now not accompa- 
nied with worthless favourites, who would delude him 
with flattery or tempt to criminal defences ; he is sur- 
rounded by men who deal truthfully with him, and do 
not shrink from telling him of the sad realities that are 
before and around him. As soon as he touches the soil 
of England, he gives utterance to a strain of sensibility 
which, if somewhat visionary, still shows a strange blend- 
ing of genuine tenderness, of royal pride, and of conscious 
weakness : 

* Faber's Sights and Thoughts, p. 288. 



174 LECTURE FIFTH. 



"I weep for joy, 
To stand upon my kingdom once again. 
Dear earth, I do salute thee with my hand, 
Though rebels wound thee with their horses' hoofs j 
As a long-parted mother with her child 
Plays fondly with lier tears and smiles, in meeting ; — 
So, weeping, smiling, greet I thee, my earth, 
And do thee favour with my royal hands." 

He conjures tlie earth — 

" Feed not thy sovereign's foe, my gentle earth !" 

He invokes it to sting rebellious feet with nettles, and 
send forth adders to throw death upon his enemies; then, 
observing, perhaps, the impatient looks of his companions, 
he adds — 

"Mock not my senseless conjuration, lords ! 
This earth shall have a feeling, and these stones 
Prove armed soldiers, ere her native king 
Shall falter under foul rebellion's arms." 

When his kinsman Aumerle gently hints that his cause 
needs prompt and manly action, the king, looking from 
the earth, which he had first invoked, up to heaven, rises 
to a loftier state of feeling in that splendid strain of 
poetry — 

" Discomfortable cousin! knowest thou not 
That when the searching eye of heaven is hid 
Behind the globe, and lights the lower world. 
Then thieves and robbers range abroad unseen, 
In murders, and in outrage, bloody here ; 
But when, from under this terrestrial ball. 
He fires the proud tops of Ae eastern pines. 
And darts his light through every guilty hole, 
Then murders, treasons, and detested sins. 
The cloak of night being plucked from off their backs, 



THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE SECOND. 176 



Stand bare and naked, trembling at themselves ? 

So when this thief, this traitor, Bolingbroke, — 

"Who all this while hath revelled in the night. 

Whilst we were wandering with the antipodes, — 

Shall see us rising in our throne the east, 

His treasons will sit blushing in his face. 

Not able to endure the sight of day, 

But self-affrighted, tremble at his sin. 

Not all the water in the rough, rude sea. 

Can wash the balm from an anointed king : 

The breath of worldly men cannot depose 

The deputy elected by the Lord. 

For every man that Bolingbroke hath pressed, 

To lift shrewd steel against our golden crown, 

God for his Richard hath in heavenly pay 

A glorious angel : then, if angels fight. 

Weak men must fall ; for heaven still guards the right." 

The doctrine of the divine and indefeasible right of 
kings surely never received a more magnificent exposi- 
tion ; and we need not wonder that Dr. Johnson, with his 
high-toned toryism, referred to it exultingly, especially to 
prove that that political theory was of earlier origin than 
the era of the Stuart kings, this play having been com- 
posed during the reign of Queen Elizabeth. But it must 
be remembered that Shakspeare speaks dramatically; 
and, while he devotes this lofty strain of poetry to 
kingly power jure divinOy he shows the insufficiency 
of the doctrine in the actual working of the govern- 
ment; and, what is more important, he puts it in the 
mouth of a king, the sacred promise of whose corona- 
tion-oath had been violated by wilful misrule, and who 
forgot that, if the doctrine of the divine right of royalty 
gave him power over his people, it imposed an awful 
responsibility to God, that could not be neglected with- 
out peril. 



176 LECTURE FIFTH. 



The evil tidings of growing disloyalty and rebellion 
came full and fast upon the unhappy Richard ; and, after 
some fitful flashes of resolution and royal pride, he sinks 
into that strain of melancholy — 

" For heaven's sake, let us sit upon the ground, 
And tell sad stories of the death of kings ; — 
How some have been deposed, some slain in war ; 
Some haunted by the ghosts they have deposed; 
Some poisoned by their wives, some sleeping killed ; 
All murthered : — for, within the hollow crown 
That rounds the mortal temples of a king. 
Keeps death his court : and there the antick sits. 
Scoffing his state, and grinning at his pomp. 
Allowing him a breath, a little scene 
To monarchize, be feared, and kill with looks j 
Infusing him with self and vain conceit, — 
As if this flesh, which walls about our life, 
"Were brass impregnable ; and humoured thus. 
Comes at the last, and with a little pin 
Bores through his castle wall and — farewell, king !" 

King Richard is beginning to feel that he is a man; and, 
as chastisement brings this change across his spirit, our 
feelings yearn towards him. When he encounters Bo- 
lingbroke, he recovers, in some degree, the decorum of 
a kingly demeanour, but the sense of his degradation, the 
fall of his pride, breaks out again : 

** God ! God ! that e'er this tongue of mine. 
That laid the sentence of dread banishment 
On yon proud man, should take it oflF again 
With words of sooth ! Oh ! that I were as great 
As is my grief, or lesser than my name ! 
Or that I could forget what I have been ! 
Or not remember what I must be now !" 

He is brought to London, still a king, but, in truth, a 
captive; and a deeper compassion is inspired by that 



THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE SECOND. 177 



beautiful description of tlie entry into the city, whicli is 
spoken by tbe Duke of York. While Bolingbroke's re- 
turn was hailed with the joyful greetings of all voices 

of the people — 

" Men's eyes 
Did scowl on Richard; no man cried, God save him; 
No joyful tongue gave him his welcome home; 
But dust was thrown upon his sacred head; 
Which with such gentle sorrow he shook ofl^ — 
His face still combating with tears and smiles, 
The badges of his grief and patience, — 
That had not God, for some strong purpose, steel'd 
The hearts of men, they must perforce have melted, 
And barbarism itself have pitied him." 

Richard resigns his throne^ and is also deposed by the 
Parliament; or rather^ it is through such formalities, that 
Bolingbroke dethrones him, and seizes the succession. 
The deposition scene in Westminster Hall, as Shakspeare 
has represented it, shows the last struggle of Richard's 
fading majesty — his unsteady mind running off perpetu- 
ally in wayward motions of fancy and feeling — shrinking 
from the final and irrevocable expression of consent to 
relinquish the crown — spending what strength was left 
in words. Meditating on the annihilation of his royalty, 
and yet dreading the necessity of the slightest effort in 
word or deed, there comes from the very bottom of his 
heart that wild and piteous wish : 

** Oh ! that I were a mockery king of snow. 
Standing before the sun of Bolingbroke, 
To melt myself away in water drops !" 

The crown is no longer on the brow of Richard ; the 
sceptre is no longer in his hand ; and the dark shadow 
of his tragic death is, to my imagination, thrown distinctly 
12 



178 LECTURE FIFTH. 



forward in the few stern words in wMcli Bolingbroke pro- 
nounces the ominous command — 

" Go, some of you, convey him to the Tower." 

Richard is soon removed to the dungeon of Pomfret 
CastJe. The prison-scene of a dethroned king seldom 
fails to be the death-scene. In what way he was deprived 
of life is doubtful ; whether by the slow misery of famine, 
as the poet Gray has represented, — 

" Close by the regal chair 
Fell Thirst and Famine scowl 
A baleful smile upon their baffled guest,"* 

or by the violence of assault, as in the tragedy. The 
gentle and lofty morality of Shakspeare was never more 
finely shown than in this, — ^that before Richard's soul is 
summoned from earth, there is added to the utterance of 
his anguish the contrite confession of a misspent life. 
You may remember how, in the tragedy of King Lear, 
the crazed mind of the ^'child-changed father" was 
soothed and healed, not only by Cordelia's voice, but by 
the remediate virtue of soft music. In the dungeon 
scene in Richard the Second, the poet has likewise 
appealed to the power of music for the different purpose 
of moving to a healthy wakefulness a distracted, I may 
say, a delirious, conscience. A sound of rude music 
reaches the imprisoned king; he listens in that mood 
in which the fancy in solitude and sorrow is so quickly 
apprehensive of all, even chance, impressions, and then 
exclaims — 

* Gray's Poetical Works, p. 172. 



THE KEIGN OF KICHAED THE SECOND. 179 



*' How sour sweet music is, 
When time is broke, and no proportion kept ! 
So is it in the music of men's lives. 
And here have I the daintiness of ear. 
To check time broke in a disordered string; 
But, for the concord of my state and time. 
Had not an ear to hear my true time broke. 
I wasted time and now doth time waste me." 

When his thouglits run on into the conscious misery 
of his downfall, still the music calls forth a kindly 
feeling and a blessing; for he thinks of it as the 
last tribute of some humble and still loyal subject, 
who is lingering with affection about his prison walls : 

" This music mads me, let it sound no more ; 
For though it have holp madmen to their wits. 
In me, it seems it will make wise men mad. 
Yet blessing on his heart that gives it me ! 
For 'tis a sign of love ; and love to Richard 
Is a strange brooch in this all-hating world." 

Eichard meets the murderous assault of Exton and the 
armed servants with prompt and manly valour; and 
his last words are expressive of the remanent feeling of 
royalty, and of his chastened and restored humanity. 

" That hand shall burn in never-quenching fire, 
That staggers thus my person. Exton, thy fierce hand 
Hath with the king's blood stained the kings's own land. 
Mount, mount, my soul ! thy seat is up on high. 
While my gross flesh sinks downward here to die." 

Thus it is that Shakspeare — a great historian — ^teaches 
how tragedy — "the power and divinity of suffering" — 
can bring the weak, the wilful, and wicked to a better 
mind, and can win for them a just sympathy; so that 



180 LECTURE FIFTH. 



one would fain close the story of this reign in the 
same compassionate spirit with which Froissart, who 
was an eye-witness of it, ends his chronicle of that 
period of English history by saying: — "King Richard 
was buried at Langley. God pardon his sins and have 
mercy on his soul T^* 

* Froissart. Johnes's Translation, vol. xii. p. 193. 



LECTURE YI * 

@;^e gl%it. oi fmrg t^e Jourllj. 

Henry the Fourtli's accession to the throne an usurpation — Cha- 
racter of the king — Error of historical reasoning — Carlyle on 
Cromwell — Henry's education and exile — Analogy to Macbeth 
— His popularity — Counsel to his son — His visit to foreign lands 
— Palestine — Castile — His return — Severe policy after his coro- 
nation — The Bishop of Carlisle — Shakspeare's "Chronicle-Plays" 
tragic — Comic element here — Palstaff and Prince Hal — Henry the 
Fourth's reign without national interest — Unquiet times — Plan of 
his crusade — Its origin and his visit to the Holy Land — Interces- 
sion of the Greek emperor for English aid — Visit of Palaeologus to 
London — St. Bernard — Plan of crusade frustrated — Insurrection in 
Scotland — Percy and Douglas — Battle of Otterbourne — Mortimer 
— Glendower — Chevy Chase — Hotspur and Falstaflf— The Battle of 
Shrewsbury — Death of Henry the Fourth. 

When Henry of Lancaster ascended tlie throne of 
England, tlie regular line of hereditary succession was 
broken for the first time for two hundred years. The 
due course of the law of inheritance had been followed 
during that period of time, and was thus strongly fortified 
by prescription and consent. The rights of no lawful heir 
to the throne had been violated since the innocent Arthur 
of Brittany fell a victim to the ruthless ambition of King 
John. After that time the crown regularly passed from 



Monday, February 1st, 1847. 

181 



182 LECTURE SIXTH. 



father to son, from first-born to first-born, during two cen- 
turies, until the aspiring Bolingbroke placed it upon his 
own brow. Not only was the rightful monarch, the frail 
and offending Richard, discrowned and dispossessed, im- 
prisoned and soon slaughtered, but the legitimate heir 
was kept out of his inheritance by that strong Lancastrian 
usurpation, which was not shaken until the violated claim 
was revived, causing a civil war which lasted for thirty 
years, and in which Englishmen died by the hands of 
Englishmen in no fewer than twelve pitched battles. 

I have endeavoured to show how the follies and vices 
of Richard the Second paved the way for Bolingbroke to 
the throne ; but I purposely confined the view as much 
as possible to the downfall of Richard, reserving for con- 
sideration the career of his adversary, as he sought to turn 
the weakness and tyranny of the king to his own great 
gain, and to rise at last upon the ruins. This career of 
Bolingbroke's was probably a long and studied course of 
politic ambition. It proved successful, in so far as the 
grand object of his hopes and aspirations was attained, — 
he gained the throne ; and we shall see whether the pos- 
session, so dearly coveted and so strenuously won, brought 
along with it happy days and a tranquil death. 

I have spoken of the occupation of the English throne 
by Henry of Lancaster, as the crowning result of long- 
continued effort and long-cherished purposes of ambitious 
premeditation ; yet, I am aware that, in the study of his- 
tory, there is an error, which frequently deludes the 
student, in this way — that, looking at any remarkable 
achievement ot jjomicai ambition, we are very apt, and 
naturally so, to persuade ourselves, that the ambition 
which has been thus successful must have been more far- 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FOURTH. 



seeing and more far-reaching than it really was. We can 
hardly believe that so great a growth has come from a 
small seedj and that most of its strength is to be traced to 
such influences as the mere course of events has given — 
the sun-light and the showers that have touched it, and 
the winds that have breathed upon it. It is with refer- 
ence to a later and far more mighty usurper, that Carlyle 
has referred to this source of error as affecting our judg- 
ment of character; and I quote his opinion, before proceed- 
ing further with the consideration of the course of life and 
action, which placed the Duke of Lancaster on the throne 
of England. ^' There is an error," writes Mr. Carlyle, 
'^widely prevalent, which perverts to the very basis our 
judgments formed about such men as Cromwell, — about 
their ambition, falsity, and such like. It is what I might 
call substituting the goal of their career for the course and 
starting-point of it. The vulgar historian of a Cromwell 
fancies that he had determined on being Protector of 
England at the time he was ploughing the marsh lands 
of Cambridgeshire. His career lay all mapped out, a pro- 
gram of the whole drama ; which he then, step by step, 
dramatically unfolded, with all manner of cunning decep- 
tive dramaturgy, as he went on — the hollow scheming 
onoxpcTTJ': or play-actor that he was? This is a radical 
perversion, all but universal in such cases. And think, 
for an instant, how different the fact is ! How much does 
one of us foresee of his own life ? Short way a-head of us 
it is all dim, — an unwound skein of possibilities, of appre- 
hensions, attemptabilities, vague-looming hopes. This 
Cromwell had not his life lying all in that fashion of 
program, which he needed then, with that unfathomable 
cunning of his, only to enact dramatically, scene after 



184 LECTURE SIXTH. 



scene ! Not so. We see it so ; but to him it was in no 
measure so. What absurdities would fall away of them- 
selves, were this one undeniable fact kept honestly in view 
by history ! Historians indeed will tell you that they do 
keep it in view; but look whether such is practically the 
fact! Vulgar history, as in this, Cromwell's case, omits 
it altogether ; even the best kinds of history only remem- 
ber it now and then. To remember it duly, with vigorous 
perfection, as in the fact it stood, requires indeed a rare 
faculty, — rare, nay, impossible. A very Shakspeare for 
faculty, or more than Shakspeare, who could enact a 
brother man's biography, see with the brother man's eyes, 
at all points of his course, what things he saw; in short, 
know his course and him, as few ^historians' are like to 
do. Half or more of all the thick-plied perversions, which 
distort our image of Cromwell, will disappear if we 
honestly so much as try to represent them so in sequence, 
as they were; not in the lump as they ^are thrown down 
before us.' '^* 

Bearing in mind the necessity of guarding against this 
error, let us, before returning to the reign of Henry the 
Fourth, look back to the previous history, to see what 
there was which at once favoured and fomented the am- 
bition that led him to the throne. He was the son of a 
younger son of Edward the Third, and his birth therefore 
gave him the chances of succession, which belong to a 
younger branch of the royal family. When he reached 
the years of manhood, animated by the chivalrous spirit 
of the times, he sought for military adventures in the dis- 
tant region of Prussia, and travelled afterwards in the 

* Heroes and Hero Worship, p. 198. 



THE KEIGN OF HENRY THE FOURTH. 185 



Holy Land. This career of foreign travel and adventure 
not only strengthened his character, hut it kept him, for 
a while at least, aloof from the voluptuous misrule of 
Richard's court, so that when he came home, the people 
were ready to look upon him more hopefully and more 
confidently than if he had heen associated, either with the 
pleasures of the king, or with the intrigues and conspira- 
cies of the nobles. There seems to have heen high am- 
bition in this Lancastrian blood, for his father, John of 
Gaunt, having married a daughter of Pedro the Cruel, as- 
sumed, on the death of that king, the titles and arms of 
the kingdom of Castile. When, at a later period of his 
life, he led an expedition to the Spanish peninsula, he 
intrusted the management of his afiairs in England to his 
son. ^^ Before his embarkation,^' writes Froissart, "and 
in the presence of his brothers, the Duke of Lancaster 
appointed his son Henry, Earl of Derby, his lieutenant for 
whatever concerned him during his absence, and chose 
for him a set of able advisers. This Henry was a young 
and handsome knight, son of the Lady Blanche, first 
Duchess of Lancaster. I never saw two such noble dames, 
so good, liberal, and courteous, as this lady and the late 
Queen of England, and never shall, were I to live a 
thousand years, which (adds the simple chronicler) is 
impossible.' '* 

The intellect and temper of Bolingbroke seem to have 
been those of a sagacious, wary, and prudent politician; 
and dim as all vision into futurity must be, he still could 
see enough there to tell him that Richard' s tenure of the 
throne would be daily and daily in greater jeopardy, and 

. * Froissart, vol. viii. p. 4. 



186 LECTURE SIXTH. 



that if tlie reign should end, as sucli reigns are apt to end, 
in turmoil and confusion, power, in the season of revolu- 
tion, would tend towards the strong hand and the firm 
mind. Richard was childless, too, and on his death the 
title would pass to the house of Clarence, to find there, 
not the vigorous grasp of a man's hand, hut the more un- 
certain hold of a child's succession, and of a female lineage. 
There was, therefore, between the weakness of Richard 
and the strength of Bolingbroke nothing interposed but 
weakness. After making every allowance against that 
historical error of which Carlyle has warned us, we cannot 
but believe that the crown of England must have been a 
perpetual prize before the eyes of Bolingbroke, not dazzling 
his keen vision, but kindling the spirit of his ambition. 
If ever man was strongly tempted to play the demagogue, 
and even almost to make the character of the demagogue 
a virtuous one, it was Bolingbroke. The hearts of the 
people were with good cause falling away from the king. 
His crafty kinsman witnessed this, and at the same time, 
was conscious of his own power to win them to himself. 
The strong men, who belonged to an elder generation — 
the uncles of the king, the sons of Edward the Third — 
who might have stood in Bolingbroke' s way, had the 
catastrophe of Richard's reign come sooner, were passing 
from the busy scene: Gloucester had been basely mur- 
dered; Lancaster was growing old, and York was content 
in easy and amiable loyalty. Bolingbroke must have seen 
how every thing seemed to conspire to make the sove- 
reignty his destiny, and in this he felt the strong impulse 
to work out his destiny. There is in this respect, to my 
mind, something in the career of Bolingbroke parallel to 
that of Macbeth, although certainly with a far inferior 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FOURTH. 187 



degree of guilt. The weird sisters foretell to Macbeth 
that he is to be King of Scotland. The wicked prophecy 
sinks deep into his heart, and he never doubts the fulfil- 
ment of it ; but how does this confidence affect him ? He 
does not passively await that fulfilment; indeed, it is 
only once that the thought of passive expectation crosses 
his mind ; 

"If chance will have me king, why chance may crown me, 
Without my stir." 

The prophecy proves an incitement to action for its fulfil- 
ment ; and, goaded, too, by the concentrated ambition of 
his wife, he perpetrates both treachery and murder to 
make himself king, because the weird sisters have pro- 
mised him that he shall be king. It seems to me that 
there was enough in the concurring events of the times 
of Richard the Second to speak to the ambitious and ap- 
prehensive spirit of Bolingbroke as audibly, almost, as 
the mysterious voices of the witches, when they addressed 
themselves to Macbeth upon the blasted heath. The 
wicked temptations which, in the case of Macbeth, are 
made visible in the hideous forms of witches, are not less 
real because unseen in the evil passions in the heart of 
Bolingbroke. He had a great game to play, and it was 
played with surpassing skill and boldness. No part of it 
was neglected or mismanaged ; and it is curious to ob- 
serve, that he appears to have begun to lay the foundation 
of his kingly fortunes by courting, not his peers, not the 
noble and the high born, but the common people. Per- 
haps the power of popularity was more recognised since 
that recent popular movement when, in Wat Tyler's re- 
bellion, sixty thousand men, aggrieved or misguided, rose 
up from the lowest level of society against the government 



188 LECTURE SIXTH. 

and the laws. On that occasion^ they sacked and burnt 
the palace of the Duke of Lancaster ; a few years pass by^ 
and Lancaster's politic son is the favourite and idol of the 
people ; he has found it worth his while to make them 
his friends rather than to have them his foes. He not 
only won golden opinions from all sorts of men, but, with 
consummate art, he so demeaned himself, that ever when 
the people turned away with indignation, or — what is 
tenfold worse — with contempt from King Richard, think- 
ing how unkingly were his courses of life, they were 
attracted by the very contrast to the royal reserve and 
stately dignity of Bolingbroke. The history in this re- 
spect is told by Shakspeare with fine poetic art in the 
remonstrance addressed by Henry the Fourth to his son, 
warning him by the contrast of his own and Richard's 
career. It is at once a poetic confession of a most refined 
and accomplished demagogue, and a description of a most 
unroyal king — the one controlling the people to his own 
uses by wielding their imagination — " the mightiest lever 
known to the moral world' ^ — the other making himself 
cheap to their sight : 

" Had I so lavish of my presence been, 
So comm on-hackney 'd in the eyes of men. 
So stale and cheap to vulgar company ; 
Opinion, that did help me to the crown. 
Had still kept loyal to possession ; 
And left me in reputeless banishment, 
A fellow of no mark, nor likelihood. 
By being seldom seen, I could not stir, 
But, like a comet, I was wondered at; 
That men would tell their children — This is he 
Others would say — Where? "Which is Bolingbroke? 
And then I stole all courtesy from heaven. 
And dress'd myself in such humility, 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FOURTH. 



That I did pluck allegiance from men's hearts, 

Loud shouts and salutations from their mouths, 

Even in the presence of the crowned king. 

Thus did I keep my person fresh and new ; 

My presence, like a robe pontifical. 

Ne'er seen, but wonder'd at ; and so my state, 

Seldom, but sumptuous, showed like a feast; 

And won, by rareness, such solemnity. 

The skipping king, he ambled up and down 

With shallow jesters, and rash bavin wits. 

Soon kindled and soon burned ; 'carded his state ; 

Mingled his royalty with capering fools ; 

Had his great name profaned with their scorns ; 

And gave his countenance, against his name. 

To laugh at gibing boys, and stand the push 

Of every beardless vain comparative ; 

Grew a companion to the common streets, 

Enfeoffed himself to popularity ; 

That being daily swallowed by men's eyes, 

They surfeited with honey ; and began 

To loathe the taste of sweetness, whereof a little 

More than a little is by much too much. 

So, when he had occasion to be seen, 

He was but as the cuckoo is in June, 

Heard, not regarded ; seen but with such eyes, 

As, sick and blunted with community, 

Afford no extraordinary gaze. 

Such as is bent on sun-like majesty 

When it shines seldom in admiring eyes : 

But rather drowz'd and hung their eyelids down, 

Slept in his face, and rendered such aspect 

As cloudy men use to their adversaries ; 

Being with his presence glutted, gorged, and fuU." 

When Bolingbroke is first introduced in the drama, it is 
after lie has been playing this politic game so long that 
he manifestly feels a confidence in his coming royalty. 
It is in the very presence of the king that he proclaims 
himself the avenger of the murdered Gloucester; yet 



190 LECTURE SIXTH. 



Grloucester was the king's uncle as well as Ms. In a very 
few words, Shakspeare has shown how high the aspiring 
spirit of Bolingbroke had already risen, when he repre- 
sents him sayingj with reference to the assassination of 
the Duke of Grloucester, his 

" Blood, like sacrificing Abel's, cries 
Even from the tongueless caverns of the earth 
To me for justice and rough chastisement." 

Who would think that the king himself, as near a kins- 
man of the murdered man, was hearing such words from 
a subject's lips? And yet, in this, Shakspeare accu- 
rately portrays the relative condition of Bolingbroke and 
Richard. 

The banishment of Bolingbroke might arrest the pro- 
gress of his ambition ; but every thing, in a short space 
of time, turns to his advantage. Froissart gives an ani- 
mated account of the conversation of the nobles, who 
assented to the sentence of exile, but sought to sweeten 
it by schemes of foreign travel, and hospitality for the 
banished Bolingbroke. " ' He may readily go,' said they 
to one another, ' two or three years and amuse himself in 
foreign parts, for he is young enough; and although he 
has already travelled to Prussia, to the Holy Sepulchre, 
Cairo, and Saint Catherine's, he will find other places to 
visit. He has two sisters. Queens of Castile and Portugal, 
and may cheerfully pass his time with them. The lords, 
knights, and squires of these countries will make him 
welcome; for, at this moment, all warfare is at end. 
On his arrival in Castile, as he is very active, he may 
put them in motion and lead them against the infidels of 
G-ranada, which will employ his time better than remain- 



THE REIGX OF HENRY THE FOURTH. 



ing idle in England/ "* Bolingbroke was^ indeed, very ac- 
tive ; but he had other thoughts of action than that which 
his considerate fellow-nobles were devising for him. He 
had other work than to lead the Spanish knights on a 
crusade against the Moors of Spain; and it was to the 
palace of Windsor, and not the Alhambra, that his hopes 
were travelling. 

The arbitrary sentence pronounced upon him by Rich- 
ard endeared him still more to the people ; and his pre- 
sence was craved the more for the very prospect of his 
absence. The demonstration of popular feeling on the 
occasion is described by Froissart with all the vivid and 
simple narrative of the chronicler : — ^' The day,'' he says, 
" the Earl of Derby mounted his horse to leave London, 
upwards of forty thousand men were in the streets lament- 
ing his departure. ^Gentle earl! will you then quit us? 
This country will never be happy until you return, and 
the days until then will be insufferably long. Through 
envy, treachery, and fear, you are driven out of a kingdom 
where you are more worthy to reside than those which 
cause it. You are of such high birth and gallantry, that 
none other can be compared to you. Why, then, will you 
leave us, gentle earl ! You have never done wrong by 
thought or deed, and are incapable of so doing.' Thus 
did men and women so piteously complain, that it was 
grievous to hear them. The Earl of Derby," he adds, 
*^was not accompanied by trumpets, nor the music of the 
town, but with tears and lamentations." If the tears of 
his countrymen were calculated to soothe the sorrows of 
his exile, they also watered his growing pride and ambi- 

* Froissart, vol. xii. p. 56. 



192 LECTURE SIXTH. 

tion. After bidding farewell to a mourning multitude, he 
went to receive in France the welcome of princely and 
royal hospitality. The Dukes of Orleans and Berry, of 
Burgundy and Bourbon, went forth to meet him; the 
meeting was joyous; and they all together, the French 
princes and the English exile, entered Paris in brilliant 
array, to receive the welcome of the King of France. 

It was brief banishment; and in bold defiance of his 
sentence did Bolingbroke come home to rescue his patri- 
mony out of the rapacious grasp of the king's own hand. 
Having formerly played, and so successfully, the dema- 
gogue to the common people, he now begins to practice 
the same arts upon the nobles who join his cause. He 
gives them thanks ; and, to win them to his service, he 
adds the large and kinglike promises of future bounty. 
He proclaims himself, too, a sworn reformer, and the un- 
relenting adversary of the King's vicious favourites, — 

" The caterpillars of the commonwealth, 
Which I hare sworn to weed and cut away." 

He begins his administration of the realm by command- 
ing them to be delivered over to execution ; as if he felt 
in himself the irresponsible power of a conqueror, or that 
his foot was already on the throne, which is the seat of 
justice. The multitude in the city of London, which wept 
when the banished Bolingbroke departed, welcomed him 
back, as the triumphant Lancaster, with joyful acclama- 
tions. The chronicler describes how men, women, and 
children, dressed in their best clothes, went out to meet 
and to greet him , and the poet-historian has finely told 
of it, through the voice of the Duke of York. It is a 
familiar passage of rare beauty : 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FOURTH. 



" The duke, great Bolingbroke, 
Mounted upon a hot and fiery steed, 
Which his aspiring rider seem'd to know. 
With slow, but stately pace, kept on his course. 
While all tongues cried — God save thee, Bolingbroke ! 
You would have thought the very windows spake, 
So many greedy looks of young and old. 
Through casements darted their desiring eyes 
Upon his visage ; and that all the walls. 
With painted imagery, had said at once, — 
Jesu preserve thee ! Welcome, Bolingbroke ! 
Whilst he, from one side to the other turning. 
Bare-headed, lower than his proud steed's neck, 
Bespake them thus, — I tJianhyou, countrymen; 
And thus still doing, thus he passed along."* 

Never did tlie course of usurpation run more smoothly : 
it seemed to flow with a natural and even tide, as if sim- 
ply because Richard was weak and Lancaster was strong. 
Looking at the personal conduct of Bolingbroke in the 
course of events before he became king, and considering 
the strict rule of hereditary succession as the settled law 
of the English monarchy, the Lancastrian establishment 
cannot but be regarded as an usurpation; but, on the 
other hand, remembering the sanction given to it by the 
Parliament, it may be viewed as one of those revolu- 
tionary changes by which, at successive periods, the 
British Constitution has been modified. 

* I have had some hesitation as to repeating these familiar pas- 
sages; but if quotations from Shakspeare are to be omitted be- 
cause they are familiar, there could be no such thing as illustra- 
tions of a lecturer's meaning. Besides, who has not observed how 
often in a common Shakspearian passage, a rare beauty, a new sug- 
gestion reveals itself, when presented in a new relation. I have 
thought it best, therefore, with but few exceptions, to allow the quota- 
tions in these lectures to remain. W. B. R. 

13 



194 lECTVRE SIXTH. 



Suet opposition as was made to Bolingbroke's acces- 
sion, was met with prompt and stern punishment ', for it 
was politic to strike quickly, and, if need be, bloodily. 
The Bishop of Carlisle, who alone among the English 
clergy had kept his allegiance to Richard in his day of 
adversity, drew down upon himself the weary punishment 
of lifelong imprisonment by the fearless protest which he 
made against the deposition of his sovereign. The nobles, 
who made an ineffectual resistance to the new succession, 
paid the bloody forfeit of their lives. It is for the ghastly 
tribute of their bleeding heads that Shakspeare repre- 
sents the new king uttering his first royal acknowledg- 
ments. 

Having now seen by what course of events, and by what 
course of policy and conduct, Henry of Lancaster became 
King Henry the Fourth of England, we have next to 
consider how royalty was worn by him, and whether the 
crown, which had been the object of his far-seeing and 
far-reaching ambition, proved its own sufficient reward — 
whether that, which, in Lady Macbeth' s words- — 

" To all his nights and days to come, 
Gave solely sovereign sway and masterdom," 

gave also sleep to those nights, and tranquillity to his 
days. 

Let me, however, first remark that, in passing from the 
historical illustrations which the tragedy of Richard the 
Second supplied us with, in the last lecture, to the illus- 
tration we may find in the two parts of Henry the Fourth, 
one cannot help being struck with the boundless variety 
of Shakspeare' s historic drama, and the versatility of his 
genius in dealing with these successive periods. While 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FOURTH. 195 



the ^^Chronicle-Plays" vary in structure and character, 
(no two of them closely corresponding,) they are all, for 
the most part, tragedies, for the simple reason that the 
history of human life is chiefly tragic, especially in the 
great historic descriptions of men, their deeds, and their 
fortunes. But the two parts of Henry the Fourth con- 
tain a large proportion of the comic element of life. 
Tragedy and comedy are here combined to produce the 
mixed drama. As the scenes change, we behold, as we 
read, the interior of the palace, with all the business and 
the stately anxieties and perplexities of the realm, or the 
castles of the nobles, where the dark game of conspiracy, 
or the bolder work of rebellion, is preparing; and then 
we turn to see the frolic and revelry of a London tavern, 
with the matchless wit of one of Shakspeare's most re- 
markable creations sparkling through the sensuality and 
profligacy of the place. We are now at Windsor with the 
king, or at Bangor with the insurgent nobles ; and then 
we are at the Boar's Head Tavern, with Falstaff and his 
gay companions. We see Henry the Fourth, in his 
palace, growing wan and careworn with the troubles of 
his government, becoming an old man in midlife; and 
then we see Falstaff fat, and, doubtless, growing fatter as 
he takes his ease at his inn, — an old man of more than 
threescore years, but with a boyish flow of frolic and 
spirits, — indulging his inexhaustible wit by making mer- 
riment for himself and the heir-apparent. We see in 
this mixed drama the tragic side of war — civil war — 
with the perplexity of the councils of the realm and the 
fierce deeds of battle ; and we see the comic side — Fal- 
staff misusing the king's press — the conscription code of 
the times, — not gathering volunteers for the war, but 



196 LECTURE SIXTH. 



picking out of the community comfortable, well con- 
ditionedj non-combatant folk, who, as lie calculates, will 
be sure to buy a release, so tbat he boasts to himself of 
having got in exchange for one hundred and fifty soldiers 
three hundred and odd pounds, to pay his tavern-bill, or 
rather to leave his tavern-bill unpaid. "I press me," says 
he "none but good householders, yeomen's sons, inquire 
me out contracted bachelors, such as had been asked twice 
upon the bans, such a commodity of warm slaves as had 
as lief hear the devil as a drum, such as fear the report of 
a caliver worse than a struck fowl or a hurt wild-duck. 
I pressed me none but such toasts and butter, with hearts 
in their bellies no bigger than pin's heads, and they have 
bought their services." 

The ludicrous aspect of war and the suffering conse- 
quent upon it are further shown in Falstaff- s well-known 
description of his soldiers — "the canker of a calm world 
and a long peace," — the vagabonds he was ashamed to 
march through Coventry with. The link of association 
between the serious and the comic parts of these plays is 
to be found in the character of him who is the Prince 
Henry of the palace and the Prince Hal of his boon-com- 
panions in the tavern — for we meet with him in both 
places, more at home, however, in the places of his amuse- 
ment than in the place of his rank. It is such mixed 
dramas as the two parts of Henry the Fourth, that espe- 
cially illustrate the remark of Mr. Hallam, that Shak- 
speare's historical plays " borrow surprising liveliness and 
probability from the national character and form of govern- 
ment. A prince, a courtier, and a slave are the stuff on 
which the historic dramatist would have to work in some 
countries : but every class of freemen, in the just subor- 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FOURTH. 197 



dination without wMch neither human society nor the 
stage, which should be its mirror, can be more than a 
chaos of huddled units, lay open to the inspection of 
Shakspeare. What he invented is as truly English, as 
truly historical in the large sense of moral history, as what 
he read/^* In the tragedy of King John we had, you 
will remember, as the representative of humble life and 
character, only James Grurney, with his conversation of 
four words ; but in Henry the Fourth, we have, I will 
not say Jiumhle life, but English low life, in a company of 
such persons as may well be supposed to have frequented 
a London tavern in those days. 

I am inclined to think that Shakspeare felt, that in 
treating dramatically the reign of Henry the Fourth he 
must needs expand the sphere of the drama, so as to com- 
prehend these varied elements, in order to supply the 
meagre historical interest of the subject. The exuberance 
of his genius and of his feelings required something more 
than the cold, uneventful misery of the palace of the politic 
Henry; and accordingly going down to the lower stratum 
of society, he must have delighted in creating Falstaff and 
his associates, to make amends for the dull company of 
the king, and the courtiers and nobles. 

The reign of Henry the Fourth is an uninteresting 
period of English history; especially does it want national 
interest. After all his long-sustained and successful am- 
bition, he came to his years of royalty, and they proved 
years of unceasing solicitude and uncertainty. The old 
chronicler utters simple truth, when he speaks of ^Hhe 
unquiet times of King Henry's reign;'' and one of the 

* Literature of Europe, vol. ii. p. 395. 



198 LECTURE SIXTH. 



elder English historians accurately describes it, when he 
says "King Henr/s reign was like a craggy mountain, 
from which there was no descent, but by a thousand 
crooked ways full of rocky stones and jetting cliffs — the 
first difficulties escaped, others are met with of more danger 
and anxiety. In such paths he walked all the time of his 
reign, that one danger was a step to another, and the 
event always doubtful; for his subjects' former desire 
being almost extinguished, his friends failing, and his 
enemies increasing, he had no other support in so painful 
a descent but his own vigilance and conduct, — helps, 
which, though they might cause him to keep on his way, 
yet they were not sufficient to preserve him from great 
weariness/' And Shakspeare, with that remarkable sig- 
nificancy which he gives to the openings of his plays, 
indicates in the very first line, the character of the reign, 
when the king is introduced, saying — 

" So shaken as we are, so wan with care, 
Find we a time for frighted peace to pant." 

It is historically true, also, when he is represented, at the 
beginning of the play and of his reign, meditating a 
crusade, planning an expedition from England, 

" To chase these pagans in those holy fields. 
Over whose acres walked those blessed feet, 
Which fourteen hundred years ago were nailed, 
Por our advantage, on the bitter cross." 

Whether this purpose was prompted by the desire to make 
atonement for such criminality as attended his accession 
to the throne, by the ecclesiastical service of a crusade, or 
with the more politic design of diverting the thoughts of 
the nation from the question of his title, or whether, as is 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FOURTH. 199 



most probable, it was a mingled motive of policy and of 
the devotional spirit of the times, it can hardly be doubted 
that the thought was seriously entertained by the king. 
When we read of such an intention at the period in which 
he flourished, we are apt, I think, to err from one or two 
'pauses, which lead us to think of it as altogether unreal — 
\s a piece of mere dramatic efibct. We do so, because we 
refer the spirit of the Crusades to an earlier era of European 
history, and also because modern historians are much dis- 
posed to treat such purposes as not only superstitious and 
visionary but hypocritical ; so that when we read of this 
intention of Henry the Fourth's, carrying our modern 
notions back, we are, I believe, almost as incredulous as 
if we had been informed that George the Fourth had 
meditated a crusade. But in the case of Henry the Fourth, 
let it be remembered that, in early life, he had travelled 
to the Holy Land, and must have witnessed the gradual 
encroachment of the Turkish power, and the decline of 
the Christian empire in the East ; he was too sagacious an 
observer not to discover that unless Western Christendom 
came to the rescue, the Turk could not be withstood. 
Moreover, it was at the beginning of Henry's reign that 
a Greek emperor, came from Constantinople to London 
to solicit from his fellow-Christians assistance for the 
defence of his capital and his empire against the aggres- 
sions of the Turks.* The help was not given; and in 



* "When Manuel had satiated the curiosity, and perhaps fatigued 
the patience of the French, he resolved on a visit to the adjacent 
island. In his progress from Dover, he was entertained at Canterbury 
with due reverence by the prior and monks of St. Austin ; and, on 
Blackheath, King Henry the Fourth, with the English court, saluted 
the Greek hero, who, during many days, was lodged and treated in 



LECTURE SIXTH. 



half a century, within the lifetime of many who were 
living when Henry the Fourth meditated his crusade, 
Mohammed with his Turks did advance, in overwhelming 
force, upon the capital of the Byzantine Caesars; the 
Greek empire, after its life of more than a thousand years, 
fell ; and from that day to this the Crescent, and not the 
Cross, has glittered in the sunbeams which shine upon the 
city of Constantine. It can now be no more than a mere 
historical speculation to think how differently the world's 
history might have been affected — ^how the cause of Chris- 
tianity might have been influenced, if that ancient Chris- 
tian empire in the East had been upheld, — if some holy 
St. Bernard had kindled the heart of European Christen- 
dom for the enterprise of a later crusade; and what a 
glorious destiny it would have been for Britain, if the 
work had been achieved by British power, — if Henry the 
Fourth, strong man and sagacious statesman as he was, 
could have devoted to such a cause the courage and wis- 
dom by which he both gained and kept the throne of 
England ! 

The intended crusade was frustrated by impending 



London as emperor of the East. But the state of England was still 
more adverse to the design of the holy war. In the same year, the 
hereditary sovereign had been deposed and murdered ; the reigning 
prince was a successful usurper, whose ambition was punished by 
jealousy and remorse; nor could Henry of Lancaster withdraw his 
person or forces from the defence of a throne incessantly shaken by 
conspiracy and rebellion. He pitied, he praised, he feasted, the em- 
peror of Constantinople; but if the English monarch assumed the 
cross, it was only to appease his people, and perhaps his conscience, 
by the merit or semblance of this pious intention." Gibbon's Decline 
and Fall of the Roman Empire, chap. Ixvi., Milman's edition, vol. vi. 
p. 221. W. B. E. 



THE REIGN OP HENRY THE FOURTH. 201 



danger at home. Scarcely was Henry the Fourth seated 
on his throne, when the flame of war was kindled upon 
both the western and northern frontiers of England. The 
people of Wales were in arms against him; and the Scots, 
who were, I may say, the perpetual foes of the English, 
came down upon the Lowlands with a strong tide of inyasion. 
The Douglas, who led that Scottish inroad, was defeated 
at the battle of Holmedon Hill, and the Scots repulsed; 
but, while the kingdom was successfully defended, the 
victory proved the remote cause of new difficulties and 
dangers to the king. The victory was gained by the son 
of the Earl of Northumberland, Henry Percy, better 
known, as Shakspeare has made it so familiar, by the 
name of Hotspur. It was by the help of these same 
Percies, father and son, that Bolingbroke had dethroned 
Richard the Second and made himself king. The victory 
over the Scots gave to the Percies another and a new 
claim upon their sovereign. There are minds so consti- 
tuted that nothing distresses or oppresses them more than 
a sense of obligation ; especially will this weakness of our 
poor human nature betray itself in minds in which pride 
is a large element — pride in their own powers and re- 
sources. The gratitude is doubtless doubly burdensome 
when a king feels that it is to his nobles, of whom lately 
he was one, that he owes his crown. There is danger of 
their becoming arrogant, and his becoming suspicious; 
and the power that is built on usurpation is most apt, 
too, to grow jealous and tyrannical. 

It is not surprising, then, to find Hotspur's victory 
quickly followed by his quarrel with the king, in conse- 
quence of the demand for the delivery of the prisoners 
taken in the battle of Holmedon. The quarrel is still 



202 LECTURE SIXTH. 



further fomented by the demand, which, on the other 
hand, Hotspur makes on the king to ransom his brother- 
in-law, Mortimer, who, while leading an expedition against 
the Welsh, had been taken prisoner by Glendower. But 
Mortimer was one of that branch of the royal family, 
whose better title Henry the Fourth had trespassed on; 
and now, instead of ransoming, he accuses him of the 
wilful betraying his command; and replies to Hotspur's 
request — 

" Shall our coffers, then, 
Be emptied, to redeem a traitor home? 
iS- <ij * * 

No, on the barren mountains let him starve ; 
For I shall never hold that man my friend, 
"Whose tongue shall ask me for one penny cost. 
To ransom home revolted Mortimer." 

The unwonted passion of the king's language betrays 
his sense of the unsoundness of his own title, and the 
jealousy of the better right of the Mortimers; and Hot- 
spur's reply is in the finest vein of indignant vindication: 

"Revolted Mortimer ! 
He never did fall off, my sovereign liege, 
But by the chance of war ; — to prove that true. 
Needs no more but one tongue for all those wounds. 
Those mouthed wounds, which valiantly he took, 
"When on the gentle Severn's sedgy bank. 
In single opposition, hand to hand. 
He did confound the best part of an hour. 
In changing hardiment with great Glendower: 
Three times they breath'd, and three times did they drink, 
IJpon agreement, of swift Severn's flood; 
"Who, then, affrighted with their bloody looks, 
B-an fearfully among the trembling reeds. 
And hid his crisp head in the hollow bank. 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FOURTH. 203 



Bloodstained with these valiant combatants. 

Never did bare and rotten policy 

Colour her working with such deadly wounds; 

Nor never could the noble Mortimer 

Eeeeive so many, and all willingly. 

Then let him not be slandered with revolt." 

The defence is in vain — tlie king implacable — and the 
conspiracy of tlie Percies is afoot. Hotspur theatens — 

"I will lift the downtrod Mortimer 
As high i' the air as this unthankful king, 
As this ingrate and cankered Bolingbroke." 

He speaks of his sovereign as no more than Bolingbroke ; 
and when he learns from the elder Percies, that in the 
reign of Richard the Second, a Mortimer had been pro- 
claimed the rightful heir, he adds — 

" Nay, then I cannot blame his cousin king, 
That wished him on the barren mountains starved. 
But shall it be that you, that set the crown 
Upon the head of this forgetful man, 
And, for his sake, wear the detested blot 
Of murd'rous subornation, shall it be, 
That you a world of curses undergo, 
Being the agents, or base second means, 
The cords, the ladder, or the hangman rather? — 
0, pardon me, that I descend so low. 
To show the line and the predicament 
Wherein you range under this subtle king. 
Shall it, for shame, be spoken in these days, 
Or fill up chronicles in time to come, 
That men of your nobility and power 
Did gage them both in an unjust behalf 
As both of you, God pardon it ! have done 
To put down Richard, that sweet lovely rose, 
And plant this thorn, this canker, Bolingbroke ?" 



204 LECTURE SIXTH. 



The character of Hotspur, whicli gives so mucli spirit 
and splendour to the revolt of the Percies, furnishes vari- 
ous historical illustration of the character of the age. 
When Shakspeare introduced him into the drama, the 
character was already familiar to the popular mind by 
those fine old ballads, ^ The Battle of Chevy Chase,' and 
^ The Battle of Otterhourne,' those rude strains, which had 
kindled the noble and heroic spirit of Sir Philip Sydney, 
and of which, in a well-known passage of his ^Defence of 
Poesy,' he said, ^^ I never heard the old song of Percy and 
Douglas, that I found not my heart moved more than with 
a trumpet/^* 

These antiquated poems supply illustration of the story 
and character of Hotspur, by showing that the bravery 
which Shakspeare has made his chief endowment had 
been developed in his previous life, in that border-warfare 
which kept the frontier of England and Scotland in per- 
petual turmoil. It was a state of watchful and revenge- 
ful hostilities; and, as the rugged stanza of the old ballad 
of Chevy Chase describes it — 

" There was never a time on the march parts, 
Sin the Douglas and the Percy met, 
But it was marvel an the red blood ran not 
As the rain does in the street." 

It was in this warfare that Hotspur had acquired tha,^ 
indomitable confidence in his personal prowess, that physi- 
cal bravery which courts danger for danger's sake, and 
which lives on the very excitement of encountering and 



* Page 45, vol. ii. of the American edition of the Library of Old 
English Prose Writers, edited by Dr. Young. 



THE REIGN OF HEXRY THE FOURTH. 205 



overcoming the perils of war. This is one form of the 
soldier's character which Shakspeare has so brilliantly 
depicted in his history of that time. 

While considering the character of Hotspur, historical 
as it is, I would point your attention to what is, I think, 
an historical use which the poet-historian makes of the 
character of Falstaff — an historical use at the same time 
that there is high poetic art in it. Hotspur and Falstaff 
(it seems strange to mention them together) are both, let 
it be remembered, soldiers. They both represent the 
military life and character of that period of English his- 
tory; and Shakspeare has so fashioned them as to pro- 
duce one of the finest and most expressive contrasts in 
the whole range of his dramas. The characters are thus, 
if you will closely examine them, made to expound each 
other by their very contrariety. In this there would be 
high poetic art ; but the historical question here is this, 
— if, as I have sought to show, the border warfare acting 
upon such a natural disposition as the young Percy's, 
made him the impetuous, martial, danger-coveting Hot- 
spur, what was there in the events or the social condition 
of that age to produce so different a form of the military 
character as that of Falstaff? The character of Hotspur 
becomes expressive of the* historical causes which made 
him the soldier he was ; and, in like manner, I think, 
we may discover historical causes of which Falstaff' s cha- 
racter may become expressive. He was old enough to 
have seen service in the wars of Edward the Third ; he 
had been page to the Earl of Norfolk, a valiant noble- 
man;* he lived on into the un warlike and voluptu- 

* "Then," says Justice Shallow, "was Jack Falstaff, now Sir John, 
a boy; and page to Thomas Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk." 



206 LECTURE SIXTH. 



ous reign of Richard the Second; and an old soldier, 
with such a sensual and self-indulgent nature as Shak- 
speare has given to Falstaff, would be very likely to settle 
down in London, to grow fat and lazy and luxurious. 
There are, therefore, it seems to me, historical causes of 
a very different kind; which, working upon two very 
different natures, are adequate to explain the monstrous 
difference between these contemporary soldiers. Hotspur 
and Falstaff. Each character has, therefore, its historical 
significancy, and the contrast between them becomes 
highly expressive. You find Hotspur seeking danger 
for danger's sake, joyous and enthusiastic at the mere 
prospect of it. When Worcester intimates to him a 
plan — 

"As full of peril and adventurous spirit, 
As to o'erwalk a current, roaring loud. 
On the unsteadfast footing of a spear." 

The quick answer is — 

"If he fall in, good night ! — or sink. or swim; — 
Send danger from the east unto the west. 
So honour cross it from the north to south. 
And let them grapple ; — ! the blood more stirs. 
To rouse a lion than to start a hare." 

Falstaff has a well-settled conclusion in his mind that — 

" The better part of valour is discretion." 
He is by no means a constitutional coward; but, cer- 
tainly, danger has in itself no charms in his eyes. 
Again, he is absolutely indifferent to honour ; he has no 
sense of it or the value of it; with his intellectual ac- 
tivity, he convinces himself logically of the worthlessness 
of it : — ^' Can honour set a leg ? No. Or an arm ? No. 
C)r take away the grief of a wound ? No. Honour hath 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FOURTH. 2W 



no skill in surgery then ? No/^ Therefore he wants 
none of it. Then compare Hotspur's rhapsody : 

" Methinks it were an easy leap 
To pluck bright honour from the pale-faced moon; 
Or dive into the bottom of the deep, 
Where fathom-line could never touch the ground. 
And pluck up drowned honour by the locks ; 
So he, that doth redeem her thence, might wear. 
Without corrival, aU her dignities." 

Before the battle of Shrewsbury, Falstaff^s thought is — 

" Would it were bed-time, Hal, and all well." 

When Hotspur, immediately after his disappointment as 
to the reinforcement from Northumberland, hears of the 
advance of the superior force of the royal army, his only 
wish is — 

" Let them come ; 
They come like sacrifices in their trim. 
And to the fire-eyed maid of smoky war. 
All hot and bleeding, wiU we offer them : 
The mailed Mars shall on his altar sit, 
Up to the ears in blood. I am on fire. 
To hear this rich reprisal is so nigh, 
And yet not ours." 

In this the spirit of the border warfare flashes out. The 
rebellion of the Percies was strengthened by confederacy 
with that remarkable personage, the Welsh chieftain, 
Owen G-lendower. Of his character and career little is 
distinctly known, and that little through the narratives 
of his foes. There rests over his history the vail of a 
splendid mystery; and Shakspeare has represented him 
chiefly as seen through the obscurity of popul^vr tradition, 



208 LECTURE SIXTH. 



according to wMcli the Welsh hero was looked on as a 
wizard and magician, who could not only sway the hearts 
of his countrymen, but could command and control the 
elements. Griendower had given allegiance to Richard j 
but, disclaiming the sovereignty of Bolingbroke, he raised 
the standard of revolt in "Wales, and his scattered coun- 
trymen — among the rest the Welsh students at Oxford 
and Cambridge — ^hastened home to rally round his ban- 
ner. He assumed the title of Prince of Wales, and made 
the last effort for the restoration of the independence of 
his country. It has been well said — 

"Owyn Griendower failed, and he was denounced as a 
rebel and a traitor : but had the issue of the ^ sorry fight' 
at Shrewsbury been otherwise than it was ; had Hotspur 
so devised and digested and matured his plan of opera- 
tions as to have enabled Owyn with his forces to join 
heart and hand in that hard-fought field ', had Boling- 
broke and his son fallen on that fatal day ; instead of lin- 
gering among his native mountains as a fugitive and a 
branded felon, bereft of his lands, his friends, his chil- 
dren, and his wife, waiting only the blow of death to 
terminate his earthly sufferings; and, when that blow 
fell, leaving no memorial behind him to mark either the 
time or the place of his release, Owyn Griendower might 
have been recognised, even by England, as he was by 
France, in the character of an independent sovereign, 
and his people might have celebrated his name as the 
avenger of his country's wrongs, the scourge of his 
oppressors, and the restorer of her independence. '^ 
While Shakspeare has done ample justice to the cha- 
racter of the noblest of the Percies, he leaves on our 



THE REIGN OF IlENKY THE FOURTH. 209 



minds^ witli admirable impartiality, a strong sense of the 
selfish origin of the revolt, and the danger of such an 
overgrown and arrogant aristocracy. It was one of the 
evils of the feudal times that men did not shrink from 
the horrors of domestic war; because, isolated as they 
were, — chieftain from chieftain, and one set of vassals 
from another, — the relations of countrymen and fellow- 
citizens were not known, or at least were not felt. Hot- 
spur, habituated, too, to his independent border warfare, 
was apt, on provocation, to turn his hostilities against his 
king, as he might do against the Douglas or any other 
Scottish noble. Whatever may be thought of the defect 
of Henry's title to the throne, there could hardly be a 
greater political evil than the existence of an aristocracy 
strong enough and proud enough to build up or to pull 
down the monarchy at their will. This was the pride of 
the Percies, as Hotspur boasted — 

" My father, and my uncle, and myself, 
Did give Mm that same royalty he wears : 
And, — when he was not six-and-twenty strong. 
Sick in the world's regard, wretched and low, 
A poor unminded outlaw sneaking home, — 
My father gave him welcome to the shore : 
And, — when he heard him swear and vow to God, 
He came but to be Duke of Lancaster, 
To sue his livery, and beg his peace ; 
With tears of innocency, and terms of zeal, — 
My father, in kind heart and pity moved. 
Swore him assistance, and performed it too. 
Now, when the lords and barons of the realm 
Perceived Northumberland did lean to him, 
The more and less came in with cap and knee ; 
Met him in boroughs, cities, villages ; 
Attended him on bridges, stood in lanes, 



14 



210 LECTURE SIXTH. 



Laid gifts before him, profiered him their oaths, 

Gave him their heirs ; as pages follow'd him. 

Even at the heels, in golden multitudes. 

He presently — as greatness knows itself — 

Steps me a little higher than his vow 

Made to my father, while his blood was poor, 

Upon the naked shore at Ravenspurg." 

But the pride of the Percies had its fall ; and^ when thej 
were defeated at Shrewsbury, and Hotspur left dead on 
that field of battle, the throne of Henry the Fourth was 
more firmly fixed than before that proud race of nobles 
had levied war against him. 

The unquiet times, however, were not tranquillized; 
and Henry's reign was, in truth, no more than a succes- 
sion of conspiracies. The battle of Shrewsbury secured 
but a brief space of repose, which was soon disturbed by 
the conspiracy of the Earl of Northumberland, and Mow- 
bray, and the Archbishop of York. This revolt was 
quelled, not by another battle, but by policy; and the 
strong king again proved too strong for his adversaries. 
But, while his possession of the throne was triumphantly 
maintained, the crown was glittering on the brow of a 
melancholy man. The genius of a great poet gives us 
the vision of the royal sadness ; and it is poetry and his- 
tory combined, that present the afi'ecting spectacle of a 
careworn king in the scene where Henry, in the noiseless 
hour of the night, in the lonely splendour of his palace, 
with slumber estranged from his eyelids, beholding from 
the palace-window the silent dwellings in a sleeping city, 
gives utterance to that beautiful apostrophe to sleep : 

"How many thousand of my poorest subjects 
Are at this hour asleep ! — Sleep, gentle sleep, 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FOURTH. 211 



Nature's soft nurse, how have I frighted thee. 

That thou no more wilt weigh my eyelids down, 

And steep my senses in forgetfulness ? 

Why, rather, Sleep, liest thou in smoky cribs, 

Upon uneasy pallets stretching thee, 

And hush'd with buzzing night-flies to thy slumber; 

Than in the perfumed chambers of the great. 

Under the canopies of costly state, 

And lull'd with sounds of sweetest melody? 

! thou dull god, why liest thou with the vile 

In loathsome beds ; and leavest the kingly couch 

A watch-case, or a common 'larum bell ? 

Wilt thou upon the high and giddy mast 

Seal up the ship-boy's eyes, and rock his brains 

In cradle of the rude imperious surge. 

And in the visitation of the winds. 

Who take the rufl&an billows by the top, 

Curling their monstrous heads> and hanging them 

With deafening clamours in the slippery clouds. 

That, with the hurly, death itself awakes ? 

Canst thou, partial Sleep, give thy repose 

To the wet seaboy in an hour so rude ; 

And, in the calmest and most stillest night, 

With all appliances and means to boot. 

Deny it to a king? Then, happy low, lie down ! 

Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown." 

That aching brow was soon to find repose ; those sleepless 
eyelids were at length to be closed^ — but only in the 
grave. '^ Henry Bolingbroke/' it has been said, "had 
reigned thirteen years ' in great perplexity and little 
pleasure.^ He had reaped as he had sown — care, insecu- 
rity, suspicion, enmity, and treason ; and ' curses not loud 
but deep.' Having quelled the rebellious nobles, he 
revived the project of a voyage to the Holy Land, to 
recover Jerusalem from the infidels. Preparations were 
made for the expedition, and the king went to the shrine 
of St. Edward the Confessor, at Westminster, there to 



212 LECTURE SIXTH. 



take his leave and to speed Mm on his voyage.'^* The 
hand of death fell on his careworn body there, and he 
was carried, to breathe his last, in the adjoining house of 
the abbot, and not in the palace of the Plantagenets. 

* Sou they 's Naval History, vol. ii. p. 50. 



LECTURE VII* 

Sorrowful but vigorous reign of the fourth Henry — His successor 
Shakspeare's favourite — His reign of conquest — His career as 
Prince of Wales — Not profligate but popular — A prince and a 
gentleman — His honour to Richard's memory — Veneration for his 
father — Relations of heirs-apparent — Statute against heresy — The 
Proto martyr — Contrast of the prince and his brother, Prince John 
— fMacbeth's want of children — Henry the Fifth a genial character 
— His associates of early life — The character of Falstaff considered 
— Morgann's essay — Friendship — Hamlet and Horatio — Henry and 
Falstaff — Falstaff's cowardice — Mr. Senioj-'s criticism — Henry's ac- 
cession to the throne — The war with France — Battle of Agincourt — 
Henry's relations to his soldiers — Sir Thomas Erpingham — Death 
of York and Suffolk — The tragedy a triumphal song. 

I HAVE endeavoured, with the help of Shakspeare's 
matchless historical illustrations, to recall to your minds 
the character of the first of the Lancastrian reigns, and 
to show how Henry Bolingbroke, after having climbed 
up the proud and royal eminence of his ambition, held 
the throne by strong statesmanship against the aggression 
of the nobles. The moral aspect of the reign, which we 
learn better from the page of poetry than of history, was 
simply this, — that Henry the Fourth wore the crown of 
England an anxious and melancholy man ; and, while m 



February 8th, 1847. 

213 



214 LECTURE SEVENTH. 



his accession, there was more of craft and less of atrocity 
than in the Scottish usurper, there were, doubtless, times 
when, in the still hours of his sleepless nights, and in 
the silent chambers of his palace, and in the more secret 
and silent chambers of his conscience, he felt the guilty 
sinking of the heart — 

"Better be with the dead 
Whom we to gain our place have sent to peace, 
Than on the torture of the mind to lie 
In restless ecstasy." 

The cares which saddened the royal years of the life 
of Henry the Fourth, did not^ however, engender that 
sorrow which saps the strength. The strong, though sad- 
hearted, man held the throne until his dying day; and 
held it so firmly, that it passed, in due course of law, to 
his son, Henry of Monmouth ; to whose reign, as Henry 
the Fifth, the regular progression of our subject has now 
brought us. 

Of the many English sovereigns whom Shakspeare has 
placed in imperishable individuality before us, Henry the 
Fifth was manifestly the favourite of the poet's heart ; 
and, in the multitude of the characters of all kinds whom 
he has portrayed or created, probably no subject was more 
congenial to him than the whole career of Henry the 
Fifth from his first introduction as Prince of Wales. 
Indeed, it could hardly be otherwise ; for, of the nine 
kings who appear in Shakspeare's historical plays, there 
is but one — and that one, Henry the Fifth — whose cha- 
racter is fairly entitled to the praise of greatness, in the 
large sense of that term, which comprehends genuine 
glory and virtue. He was the only one of those crowned 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FIFTH. 215 



heads in whom royalty was united to a fine and lofty 
humanity. Therefore it is that, without forsaking the 
path of that admirable historical impartiality, in which 
the genius of the poet-historian forever moved, he found 
in the character of Henry the Fifth, and in him alone, 
scope for the richest panegyric which the soul of a great 
poet could, out of its abundant affluence, shower upon the 
memory of a fellow-man. I have already adverted to the 
variety displayed in the composition of these " Chronicle- 
Plays/' and, as the reign of Henry the Fifth was greatly 
distinguished from the other reigns, so is the drama, 
which is devoted to it, altogether peculiar. The reign 
was a short and splendid career of foreign conquest, 
achieved by one who was at once king, hero, and con- 
queror ; and the play is a kind of lyrical commemoration 
of the victory and the victor. 

Henry the Fifth had a brief reign of nine years ; but 
this was preceded by a period of his life, the memory of 
which is closely connected with the estimate of his cha- 
racter, — the thirteen years of his father's reign, during 
which he was Prince of "Wales. There came down to 
Shakspeare not only a very distinct tradition, but also 
complete historical consent, that Henry's career as Prince 
of Wales was one of unwonted levity and unworthy com- 
panionship ; and, upon such tradition and such historical 
account, the poet has so worked as to give a most vivid 
impression of the life of the heir-apparent during his 
father's reign. The dramatic skill with which this has 
been done, is unquestioned ; but it may also, I believe, 
be shown that there is equal historical fidelity; and, 
passing into a still higher region of thought, I think it 
may be shown that the poet has herein displayed that 



216 LECTURE SEVENTH. 



moral wisdom which is one great element of all his 
dramas; and, indeed, without which, poetry of the 
highest order cannot exist. 

Respecting the career of the Prince of Wales, there 
appear to be two opposite and conflicting opinions. On 
the one hand he is represented as a low profligate, reck- 
less, heartless, and dissolute, the perpetual inmate of 
taverns, and a licentious brawler. On the other side, the 
effort is made, and with considerable historical research, 
to prove that the traditional accounts of the prince's early 
life are altogether unfounded; that Shakspeare's repre- 
sentation of him, as an historical portrait, is misleading 
and unjust, and that the prince's life was blameless and 
irreproachable. Indeed, it might well be said, that a 
career of excessive profligacy, continued through the 
years of youth and into the years of manhood, could not 
in nature be the prelude to a kingly course so sagacious 
and so heroic. I do not believe that Henry of Mon- 
mouth, when Prince of Wales, lived such a life of disso- 
luteness and profligacy; and more confident am I that 
Shakspeare has not so represented it. At the same time 
the tradition respecting the prince was too general and 
too well fortified to be wholly discredited. It cannot 
reasonably be cast aside as a fiction by which men for a 
long while — and nobody can tell why — deluded them- 
selves and others. Shakspeare is faithful to the tradition, 
which he has so informed with the life-giving power of 
the imagination as to corroborate the truth of it ; and at 
the same time he has so portrayed Henry's princely days, 
as to reconcile them with his royal days, and thus to 
represent them in moral harmony. He does not resort 
to the marvel of a sudden conversion and an instantaneous 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FIFTH. 



growth of virtue — a monstrous and unnatural change — 
which would effectually hinder us from feeling the iden- 
tity of the Prince Henry of one drama with the King 
Henry of another. With Shakspeare's g-uidance, there- 
fore^ we can, I am inclined to think, learn what the one, 
but varied, life of Henry really was ; for the poet drew 
the history of that life from tradition, and also from the 
deep philosophy of human nature in his own soul. 

When Prince Henry is first introduced into the 
drama, it is in the palace, but in the company of two 
of his gay companions, who visit him there. Whatever 
contaminating influences there were in such companion- 
ship, it was, at least, free from the vice of destroying his 
moral health by the poison of flattery. So far from any 
thing like this adulation, the conventional restraints of 
rank are cast aside — even the decorous formalities of so- 
ciety are relaxed — and there is an equality of intercourse 
and almost unbounded freedom in it. But all this is on 
the surface, and does not reach down to the real nature 
of the prince ; for, the moment he is left alone, the first 
words he utters, disclose his knowledge of himself and of 
his companions, and his consciousness of .what is due 
from himself to himself. We see that he has a moral 
self-possession — whether it will be impaired by sjich com- 
panionship and self-indulgence remains to be considered ; 
but the first soliloquy shows us that, at least, he was not 
reckless, but that he was thoughtful ; and that, whatever 
might be the outward show, silently and secretly he was 
cherishing lofty and pure aspirations : 

** I know you all, and will awhile uphold 
The unyoked humour of your idleness; 
Yet herein will I imitate the sun, 



218 LECTURE SEVENTH. 



Who doth permit the base contagious clouds 

To smother up his beauty from the world. 

That when he please again to be himself, 

Being wanted, he may be more wondered at. 

By breaking through the foul and ugly mists 

Of vapours that did seem to strangle him. 

If all the year were playing holidays. 

To sport would be as tedious as to work; 

But when they seldom come, they wished-for come, 

And nothing pleaseth but rare accidents. 

So when this loose behaviour I throw off. 

And pay the debt I never promised. 

By how much better than my word I am, 

By so much shall I falsify men's hopes ; 

And like bright metal on a sullen ground, 

My reformation, glittering o'er my fault. 

Shall show more goodly and attract more eyes 

Than that which hath no foil to set it off. 

I'll so offend to make offence a skill; 

Redeeming time when men think least I will." 

This soliloquy, at his first introduction, sets before us 
the thoughtful element in the prince's character; and we 
are thus forewarned of the reserved power by which he 
will be able to raise himself above the loose behaviour 
and companionship he for a while indulges in. It is, 
doubtless, a perilous calculation, — present self-indulgence 
and prospective reformation, — and we shall see, in a sub- 
sequent passage of his life, as represented by Shakspeare, 
that the transition is not accomplished without a struggle. 
But, during this whole course of free life, the prince is 
never so represented as to make us forget that he is a 
prince and a gentleman — never so lowered as to make 
him forfeit all respect, or falsify the promise given by 
the hidden thoughtfulness of his nature. Still, the ques- 
tion occurs — ^both historically and dramatically — was this 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE PIFTH. 219 



a career of wanton self-indulgence, or were there causes 
and impulses whicli gave such s-trange direction to his 
early manhood ? I believe his alienation, such as it was, 
from the palace and the court, was in accordance both 
with historical truth, and the requisites of poetic art; 
but to show this, we must look back on his earlier 
days. 

During the first thirteen years of his life, high as was 
the rank of the family, Henry of Monmouth was the son, 
not of a king, but of a nobleman ; the years of his boy- 
hood were spent, therefore, without the restraints and 
formalities of a royal household. He lived as one of the 
people, and learned to feel as such. This feeling of free- 
dom was, doubtless, increased by the high-spirited boy 
being early initiated into military life. It is worthy of 
notice that, when a mere youth, he received the honour 
of knighthood; and, what is still more noticeable, he 
received it at the hands of his sovereign, the frail and 
unfortunate Richard the Second. To the memory of that 
monarch, dethroned as he was by his father, Henry of 
Monmouth appears to have cherished a feeling of respect- 
ful gratitude. That sentiment could exist in his mind 
only in conflict with the sentiment and the duty of filial 
piety ; and it is precisely such a conflict of obligation and 
feeling, working upon sensitive and thoughtful r'^'spositions, 
that wrests them from their even and natural course. 
Remember, by way of example, how the gentle and medi- 
tative spirit of Hamlet was afl"ected, even unto the unset- 
tling of his intellect, by the conflict between duty to his 
living mother, and the profound love and veneration to 
his dead father — it forced him to moody musing and fitful 
melancholy. We can conceive how, in like manner, 



220 LECTURE SEVENTH. 



thougli in a very different degree, a thouglitfal ctiaracter 
like the Prince of "Wales may have liad his youthful 
hours of painful reflection^ when he -vras old enough to 
observe the establishment of his father's power upon the 
iTiins of the fallen royalty of Eichard. Having seen his 
first military adventures under the banner of Richard, 
having, too, received honours from him which would 
naturally sink deep into a generous heart, then in the full 
flush of uncalculating youth, Henry may well have looked 
with commiseration^ at least, upon the decline and down- 
fall of his flrst king, although the revolution placed the 
crown upon his father's brow, and showed the succession 
in prospect for himself. Now, I do not mean to assert 
that this was so ; but considering what we do know of his 
later character and conduct, it is not an unreasonable spe- 
culation which leads us to think there were times when 
the breast of this young prince was agitated by the various 
and contending emotions of pride at the elevation of his 
family, duty to his father, and the lingering loyalty to the 
poor dethroned Richard, or pity for the memory and the 
misfortunes of his first chieftain. One of the first acts of 
Henry's reign was to cause the body of Richard the 
Second to be removed from its secluded grave at Langley, 
and with the solemn funeral pomp of kings to be interred 
at Westminster by the side of his queen, — ^^the good 
Queen Anne,'' — in the tomb which Richard had caused 
to be prepared for her and for himself. It is to this act 
of pious loyalty that Shakspeare refers when he represents 
Henry, on the eve of his great battle, as praying — 

" Xot to day, Lord ! 
Oh, not to day ! think not upon the fault 
My father made in compassing the crown ! 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FIFTH. 



I Richard's body have interred anew ; 
And on it have bestowed more contrite tears 
Than from it issued forced drops of blood. 
Five hundred poor I have in yearly pay, 
Who twice a day their withered hands hold up 
Toward heaven, to pardon blood ; and I have built 
Two chantries, where the sad and solemn priests 
Sing still for Richard's soul." 

It will be observed^ therefore, that the speculation re- 
specting Henry's feeling towards his former sovereign — 
the king of his boyhood — has an actual historical basis. 
I will not venture to push this speculation so far as to 
say that the sentiment which I have just spoken of alien- 
ated his affection from his father; that he cherished such 
loyalty to the dead Richard's memory as to induce a slack 
allegiance to his living king — an unnatural estrangement 
from his own parent. But I do believe that there may 
most naturally have existed in the mind of the Prince of 
Wales such a state of conflicting emotion as to make the 
palace of his father uncongenial to him. His is not the 
constitution of Hamlet, and he does not, like the heart- 
stricken Prince of Denmark, wander through the royal 
chambers disconsolate, moody, and meditative; but he 
goes forth into the world — into the common throng of the 
world — into the crowded thoroughfares of life. All that 
is certainly known of this part of his career, leaves upon 
the mind an impression which associates him not at all 
with his father's accession to the throne, and only occa- 
sionally with his father's administration of the kingdom ; 
and Shakspeare's representation is, therefore, in complete 
harmony with the imperfect historical information. The 
highest dramatic art and general fidelity to history are 
here combined to work out the poet's purpose of portray- 



222 LECTURE SEVENTH. 



ing the character of a king who should be entitled to be 
respected and honoured and loved ; and this was to be 
accomplished by no fulsome adulation, by no monstrous 
eulogy, but by plain dealing with the imperfections of 
human nature. 

On the one hand, it was necessary so far to preserve 
the relations between Prince Henry and Henry the 
Fourth as to avoid all imputation of a deliberate unfilial 
conduct, of purposed undutifulness from the son to the 
father. This would have cast a cloud that would have 
darkened all his after story. It would have been too like 
what has occurred at a more modern period of British 
history, when, in the family of the Hanoverian kings, the 
relation of father and son seemed to be governed by a 
law of reciprocal dislike and repugnance; as when, in the 
reign of Greorge the First, his son, the Prince of Wales, 
resented, by a premeditated insult, what he spoke of as 
his father's ^' insolence'^ to him; and the king resented 
the undutiful conduct by turning the heir-apparent out 
of the palace: or when, some twenty years later, that 
Prince of Wales, after he had become Greorge the Second, 
under very much the same circumstances, went through 
the same ceremony which had been practised on himself, 
by turning his son, the Prince of Wales, out of doors; so 
that this kind of disreputable family feud seemed to be a 
part of the law of inheritance, — which was again shown, 
too, in the case of George the Third and his Prince of 
Wales.* Now, inasmuch as these half-Grerman princes 



* In reference to the early Hanover kings and princes, it has often 
occurred to me that the later Stuarts must have been bad indeed when 
a moral nation, such as the English, could prefer and endure repulsive 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE EIFTH. 223 



of later days were greatly inferior to the more ancient 
Prince of Wales^ and as history makes mention of no such 
scandalous squabbling between him and Henry the Fourth, 
whatever cause of dissatisfaction Prince Henry may have 
given, it was not of such a nature as to affix a lasting 
stain upon his name. When his father reproaches him 
with his habits of life, the answer is in a strain, not of 
insolent resentment, but of modest and placid respectful 
defence : 

*' So please your majesty, I would I could 
Quit all offences with as clear excuse, 
As well as, I am doubtless, I can purge 
Myself of many I am charged withal; 
Yet such extenuation let me beg. 
As in reproof of many tales devised, — 
Which oft the ear of greatness needs must hear, — 
By smiling pick-thanks and base newsmongers, 
I may, for some things true, wherein my youth 
Hath faulty wandered and irregular. 
Find pardon on my true submission." 

The continued remonstrance and admonition of the king 
are answered simply — 

" I shall hereafter, my thrice gracious lord, 
Be more myself." 



reprobates — coarse adulterers, and violaters of every domestic tie — 
such as were George the First and Second, and Prince Frederic. Is 
there not some faint analogy in our day — the points of contrast being 
equully marked — between Falstaflf and poor Sheridan ? I have some- 
Avhere seen a very sad narrative of an accidental meeting, on the road 
near Brighton, of Sheridan, not long before his death, and the Prince 
Regent; and Sheridan, in his threadbare coat, turning down a bypath 
to avoid his former friend. As Hostess Quickly says of Falstaflf when 
dying,—" The king had killed his heart." W. B. R. 



LECTURE SEVENTH. 



Neither in tlie history of the chronicler nor in the his- 
tory of the poet does there appear any such enmity be- 
tween the king and the Prince of Wales^ as would throw 
an impediment in the way of our admiration and enjoy- 
ment of the son's character. We feel that it is a differ- 
ence easily adjusted; and the prince is entitled so to 
speak^ when he gayly tells his companions — 

" I am good friends with my father, and may do any thing." 

Now, while the filial relation is duly preserved, it is, on 
the other hand, desirable that Prince Henry should not 
be too intimately identified with his father's reign. It is 
well that he, whose glorious career is to be the theme of 
a poet's richest praise, should not be associated in cur 
thoughts with an administration of the realm which was 
so different from his own — a reign of terror and not of 
loyal love — a reign of divided and not unanimous alle- 
giance. The dominion of Henry the Fourth was that of 
stern, hard, suspicious power. There were conspiracies, 
and craft and policy were needed to countermine them; 
but we are glad to believe that, as Shakspeare, following 
the traditions, has represented it. Prince Hal took little, 
if any, part in such affairs of the realm. Besides, the 
reign of Henry the Fourth was not only an unquiet and 
perplexed time, but it was a dismal era of the beginning 
of religious persecution. It was in that reign that the 
stern law was enacted, by which heresy was to be punished 
with the slow torture of the death by fire, and the Proto- 
martyr of English Eeformers perished at the stake.* 

* Stat. 2, Hen. 4, c. 15. De heretico comburendo. The preamble sets 
forth "that divers unauthorized preachers go about teaching new 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FIFTH. 



It was part of the administration of Henry the Fourtli 
to cmsli the progress of the first movement of the Refor- 
mation, which began with John Wycliff and the Lollards. 
With a reign thus characterized by crafty policy and 
ecclesiastical intolerance, the young Prince of Wales hap- 
pily is not identified. In this respect, Shakspeare shows 
a contrast between him and his brother, Prince John of 
Lancaster, who appears. to have shared more in the coun- 
cils of the king. And what is the result as to his char 
racter? He is not only the "sober-blooded boy'' that 
Falstaff complains of, as one he could not make laugh, 
but, when he is engaged in suppressing the second great 
conspiracy of the nobles, he does so, not in open battle, 
like Prince Henry at Shrewsbury, but by a piece of hard 
and treacherous surprise. This is incomparably worse 
than revelry with Falstaff, and wisely and happily is 



doctrines and heretical opinions, making conventicles and confedera- 
cies, holding schools, writing books, misinforming the people, and 
daily committing enormities too horrible to be heard ; and that the 
bishops are unable to repress these offences because the offenders 
despise ecclesiastical censures, and when they are cited before their 
ordinaries, depart into another diocese ; the statute therefore provides 
as a remedy for these evils, that the bishop shall have power to arrest 
and confine persons defamed or vehemently suspected of such offences 
till they make their canonical purgation ; and, if they be convicted, to 
punish them with imprisonment, and a fine to the king. It then enacts 
that if any person so convicted shall refuse to abjure such preachings, 
doctrines, opinions, schools, and misinformations, or, after abjuration, 
shall be proved to have relapsed, then the sheriff of the county, or the 
mayor and bailiffs of the nearest borough, shall, on requisition, be pre- 
sent at the pronunciation of the sentence, shall receive the person so 
condemnned into custody, and shall cause him to be burnt on a high 
place before the people, that such punishment may strike terror into 
the minds of others." 1 Statutes at Large, 441. W. B. R. 
15 



LECTURE SEVENTH. 



Sliakspeare's Prince Hal kept thus apart from his fa- 
ther's reign. The poet, I believe, loved this historical 
character too well to leave him much in the palace ; and, 
accordingly, taking authority from the traditionary stories 
of the prince's lighter hours, he carried him away from 
the court, and transported him to a more genial and, I 
venture to say, a better place than the palace — a London 
tavern frequented by Falstaff — the moral perils of such a 
scene and companionship being small in comparison with 
those of crafty and tyrannical rule. 

In presenting to our minds his splendid conception of 
the character of his favourite king and hero, Shakspeare 
would not have us believe Henry the Fifth had been 
trained in such a school as his father's reign. In such 
an element as that king's councils, he does not show him 
to us; it was better that the mere policy of that reign 
should run its course without him ; and from such con- 
tact Shakspeare, for the most part, keeps him away. 
There is illustration of this in what has struck me as a 
beautiful piece of poetic art, which occurs in another of 
his dramas. In the tragedy of Macbeth there are inti- 
mations that Macbeth had children. Lady Macbeth, in 
one of the most appalling passages before the murder of 
Duncan, speaks of herself as having been a mother ; and 
it is one of the pangs of Macbeth' s ambition that the 
sceptre is to be wrenched from his family with an 
unlineal hand, — ^^no son of his succeeding," as the 
weird sisters predicted. But no children of Macbeth' s 
appear in the drama: no child's voice is heard in his 
guilty castle, nor in his wretched palace. Why is this, 
but that the gentle spirit of Shakspeare, so full of fond- 
ness for children, so reverential of the beauty and the 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FIFTH. 227 



holiness of childliood, could not bring innocence into 
any association with the accumulated guilt of that tra- 
gedy ? He could not, I believe, find it in his heart to 
show the children of such guilty parents. The very pre- 
sence of a child of theirs would have aggravated the 
hideousness of the crimes of this blood-stained pair be- 
yond the true scope of genuine tragic emotion, and even 
the imagination of Shakspeare could not have wrought 
the incongruous elements into poetic harmony. 

It seems to me that it is upon somewhat a similar 
principle, though in a very different degree, that the 
career of Prince Henry is kept distinct from the career 
of Henry the Fourth. Retributive justice was to fall, as 
we shall hereafter see it did fall, with fearful force upon 
the descendants of the usurping Bolingbroke, but not 
until, in one of its more distant and mighty vibrations, it 
should strike, not upon the first, but second generation. 
The reign of Henry the Fifth was to be presented as a 
virtuous and glorious dominion ; and retribution was not 
to be thought of as hanging over it. This is at once the 
poetic and historical view of it; and therefore it was de- 
sirable to disconnect it, as far as possible, from the primal 
guilt which at length brought the retribution down. It 
is well, indeed, that Prince Hal is a stranger in his father's 
palace. 

But then comes the consideration, why, if estranged 
from the court and the royal councils, as the king de- 
scribes him — 

*' Almost an alien to the hearts 
Of all the court and princes of my blood/' — 

the prince .should be found in such companionship as that 



LECTURE SEVENTH. 



in which he is chiefly presented, and which historical tra- 
dition tells of his having sought. What was the link of 
association between him and Falstaff ? Whatever it was, 
the association did not rise to the dignity and feeling 
of friendship ; it was companionship and nothing more — 
such companionship as would, however, be regulated in 
some degree by the laws of friendship. In the large 
company of the characters that people Shakspeare's plays, 
whether tragic or comic, I believe few instances of male 
friendship are presented there. It was with a true know- 
ledge of human nature, and not with any morbid, and 
therefore unjust, estimate of it, that Shakspeare con- 
sidered, I suppose, friendship between men as a relation 
that is rarely of long duration, and, more rarely, of very 
deep feeling. The course of the world hardly admits of 
it, save under peculiar and happy circumstances. We 
are apt, I believe, often to think that the sympathy of 
friendship, or even companionship, is proof of similarity 
of character; that men become friends and companions 
only because they are alike ; and that no friendship can 
be permanent unless it be founded upon strong and com- 
plete resemblance of character and disposition. That 
there must be some kind of congeniality is undoubtedly 
true; but, with certain resemblances of mind and feelings, 
there may be dissimilitude, which, so far from being a 
liindrance to the strength of a friendship, will engender a 
more real and abiding affection, because the two parties 
are not minutely and identically alike. Even in the 
closer and lifelong relation of man and wife, it is reason- 
able to believe that some, I will not say positive differ- 
ences, of character, but varieties of disposition, will 
strengthen the affection due to that vow, which, in 



THE REIGN OP HENRY THE FIFTH. 229 



Spenser's fine phrase, ^^ would endless matrimony make/^* 
The reason for this congenial influence of a certain dis- 
similitude of character, especially in friendship, is perhaps 
simply this, that one party, wanting some quality of mind 
or feeling, and conscious of that want, has it supplied by 
the difi"erently constituted character of the friend or com- 
panion. This, of course, implies that there is present at 
the same time such generosity of disposition, or such a re- 
lation of the parties, as will preclude all possibility of 
reciprocal jealousy or pride of superiority. That being the 
case, their various properties make up for their mutual 
wants ; understanding, however, that there must be pre- 
served some main elements of direct sympathy — some 
ground common to them both. These principles are finely 
illustrated by Shakspeare in such a friendship as that of 
Hamlet and Horatio : they resemble each other in the ex- 
cellent moral purity and manliness of their character, but 
in many respects, as to intellectual constitution and as to 
habits of feeling, it is hardly possible for two men to be 
more unlike. Hamlet is full of philosophy, of poetry; 
meditative, sensitive to the highest degree, — the equipoise 
of his nature disturbed by what befalls him ; on the other 
hand, Horatio has not a particle of the poetical or philo- 
sophical constitution or temperament; he is one of the 
most matter-of-fact persons conceivable, with strong and 
genuine feelings, but with those feehngs imperturbably 
adjusted and balanced; and it is exactly in this particu- 
lar that he is the appropriate friend of Hamlet, as Hamlet 
himself feels. He takes Horatio as his chosen friend, 
because he finds in his sober-minded, judicious character 

* Poetical Works, vol. v. p. 140. 



LECTURE SEVENTH. 



sometMng tliat mal^ es up for his own infirmity of over- 
sensitiveness. 

I have dwelt somewhat upon this train of thought, be- 
cause in seeking for the point of association between the 
prince and Falstafi, it should be understood that possibly 
we may find it is ^^by contraries that they are joined more 
closely still/' The chief sympathy between them, I be- 
lieve, is high intellectual activity. With such a consti- 
tution of mind, Prince Henry had early in life acquired 
a relish for the external excitement and animation of 
military life; but finding no fit field of adventure, and 
withdrawing himself, as we have noticed, from the busi- 
ness of the government, he needs employment, or at least 
excitement, for the pent-up energies of his mind. He 
craves some relief that shall be at the same time excite- 
ment, and to supply this, Shakspeare gives the unparalleled 
wit of Falstafi*. The intellect of Falstafi* possesses an un- 
wearied activity, which spends itself altogether in the 
direction of wit. There is no exhausting it; there is no 
tiring it; there is no such thing as taking it unawares. 
Coleridge is, no doubt, right when he says that there is 
no humour in the cliaracter of Falstaff ; it is all wit, and 
that is one form of intellectual energy. Humour has more 
to do with feeling; it is often joined with deep pathos : — 
it is of the heart, but wit is of the head, and in its high 
forms is intensely intellectual.* It is this, and only this, 



* Coleridge's words are, "Pistol, Nym, and id genua omne, do not 
please me as characters, but are endured as fantastic creations — foils to 
the native wit of Falstaff. I say icit emphatically : for this character, 
so often extolled as the masterpiece of humour, neither contains, nor 
was meant to contain, any humour at all." Literary Remains, (Ed. 
1836,) vol. ii. p. 271 ; see also vol. i. p. 134. W. B. R. 



THE REIGN OP HENRY THE FIFTH. 231 



that gives to Falstaff his power over the prince, and mates 
the witchery of his companionship. Falstaff, of course, 
feels his own power, and lays himself out (it is well worth 
his while to do so) to cultivate it for the amusement of 
the heir-apparent. He does not husband his wit, in which 
he was too affluent to need any economizing of it for 
the prince's use, but he provides materials, as when, 
after his visit to Justice Shallow he says — ^^ I will de- 
vise matter enough out of this Shallow to keep Prince 
Henry in continual laughter, the wearing-out six 
fashions, and he shall laugh without intervallums. It 
is much, that a lie with a slight oath, and a jest with 
a sad brow, will do with a fellow that never had the ache 
in his shoulders ! 0, you shall see him laugh till his face 
be like a wet cloak ill-laid up.'' 

For the lack of better employment, the prince has, 
from Falstaff' s wit, high enjoyment, while it lasts. His 
other gay companions are very insufficient for him ; the 
time hangs heavy on his hands, till Falstaff joins them. 
It is the stimulus of a temporary intoxication. The prince 
is idle, not from the love of idleness, but for want of a con- 
genial sphere of action ; he is playful to keep care away, 
for beneath all his playfulness there is an undercurrent 
of thoughtfulness, which, though covert at first, is pro- 
gressive, until it assumes the aspect of almost melancholy 
pensiveness in his royal years. He is just in that con- 
dition of mind that he needs such a contrariety of character 
as Falstaff presents, — a man, who is enamoured of an idle 
life from pure love of inactivity, who is careless habitually, 
if not constitutionally. His vivacity does not, like the 
prince's, cover any thing — there is nothing beneath : it is 
a vein, however, that you cannot dig through. Besides 



LECTURE SEVENTH. 



his wit, all else is sensuality, self-indulgence, shameless- 
ness. But, reprobate as Falstaff is, his character is not 
contemptible. His grossness may be disgusting, his pro- 
fligacies most reprehensible — so that he may be censured 
or condemned — ^but he is not to be despised. And this 
presents the question of his imputed cowardice. On 
this point there has been a very great misapprehension, 
which, perhaps, even now, is not altogether done away 
with. The persuasion that Shakspeare intended to repre- 
sent Falstaff as a coward, was so universally entertained, 
that when, during the last century, a very ingenious and 
argumentative essay, much in advance of the criticism 
of that day — the thin and vapid criticism of Dr. Blair and 
Lord Karnes — ^when this essay appeared, vindicating Fal- 
staff from the charge of cowardice, it was looked upon as 
a freak of playful paradox. But it was irrefutable argu- 
ment, which has been fortified by all the fine philosophical 
criticism that has since been bestowed upon the Shak- 
sperean drama. I shall not, of course, depart so far from 
my chief subject as to enter into that argument, and must 
content myself with the assurance that there is not a doubt 
in the case left. Falstaff is no coward ; there is no con- 
stitutional timidity about him. The clue to his character 
in this particular is given at the very opening of the drama. 
When Poins says, ^' Well, for two of them, I know them 
to be as true-bred cowards as ever turned back, — and for 
the third, (that is, Falstaff,) if he fight longer than he sees 
reason, I'll forswear arms.^' That is the character of 
Falstaff' s courage — ^he will fight as long as he sees reason, 
and not a moment longer will sense of honour or any thing 
else hold him to it. This may be dishonour, but it is not 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FIFTH. 233 



cowardice; so it is througliout, if carefully examined; 
and FalstaflF describes himself justly wlien tie says to tlie 
prince, ^^ Indeed, I am not John of Gaunt, your grand- 
father; but yet no coward, Hal/^* 



* The "ingenious and argumentative essay" to which my brother 
refers is " The Essay on the Dramatic Character of Sir John Falstaff, 
by Morgann," which I cannot help regarding yet as a fantastical 
attempt to reverse a popular judgment. The isolated passages relied 
on, prove nothing or too much ; as, for example, when Mrs. Quickly 
means to arrest the fat knight, she says : 

^'Hostess. "Where is your yeoman? Is it a lusty yeoman? will 'a 
stand to't ? 

Fang. Sirrah, where's Snare ? 

Hostess. lord, ay : good master Snare. 

Snare. Here, here — it may cost some of us our lives, for he will 
etab." 

Stabbing a bailiff or a dead Percy seems to be the extent of Falstaff's 
positive courage; and a coward, a runaway coward, will he remain 
during all time. It seems to me — though this may be playful paradox 
too — that a far better case might be made out for poor Bardolph, 
who was hanged for robbing a church. For instance, Bardolph was 
trustworthy, or in the crisis at Shrewsbury he would hardly have 
been made by the prince "bearer of despatches" to Prince John 
and Lord "Westmoreland. "When Falstaff is threatened by the sheriff's 
officers, it is on Bardolph he calls to keep them off. "When Pistol 
and Nym quarrel, and seem to be coming to blows, Bardolph in- 
terposes, and with his drawn sword keeps the peace. At the bridge 
at Harfleur, Bardolph makes at least a good show of fighting, calling 
his followers " on, on to the breach," and obeys Captain Fluellen's 
orders of attack. He uttered brave words at the bridge, and Fluellen 
is willing to intercede with the king, when Bardolph is to be hanged 
for sacrilege, but is interrupted by the stern refusal, (a little harsh from 
Henry's lips to his old companion,) "We would have all such offenders 
to be cut off." It must be admitted (I am not sure Morgann is equally 
candid as to his hero) that the " Boy," as well as Poins, disparages Bar- 
dolph as "white-livered and red-faced," as one "who faces it out and 
fights not," and that at Gadshill he did run with the rest; but the par- 



234 LECTURE SEVENTH. 



It would, indeed, have greatly increased the difficulty 
of extenuating the prince's companionship with Falstaff, 
if the fat knight had been a pitiful coward instead of the 
old soldier in whom the sense of voluptuous comfort has 
outgrown all sense of chivalry. When the rebellion of 
the Percies produces a war, he is ready for military ser- 
vice, as affording him lawless chances of providing for 
himself; and when the prince tells him, ^^ I have procured 
thee. Jack, a charge of foot,'' his only answer is, "I would 
it had been of horse/' The rebellion calls the prince into 
action, and his prompt zeal shows not only that his course 
of life has not enervated him, but how gladly he finds a 
more congenial scene. It is in the midst of his loose 
companions that he gives his several orders : 

" Go, bear this letter to Lord John of Lancaster, 
My brother John ; — this to my lord of "Westmoreland, — 
Go, Poins, to horso, to horse ; for thou and I 
Have thirty miles to ride yet ere dinner-time. 
Jack, meet me to-morrow i' the Temple Hall ; 
At two o'clock i' the afternoon ; 
There shalt thou know thy charge ; and there receive 
Money and order for their furniture. 
The land is burning : Percy stands on high, 
And either they or we must lower lie.*' 

It was by the heroism of the Prince of Wales that 
the victory over the Percies at Shrewsbury was won : it 
gave safety to his father's throne, and it redeemed his 
own good name. 

tisans of Falstaff should remember the reason Bardolph gives for his 
llight when the prince reproaches him for cowardice : 

"Faith, I ran when I saw others run." 
On the whole, I submit the Bardolphian heroic theory with equal, if 
not great, confidence. ^Y. B. B. 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FIFTH. 235 



After the excitement of this campaign, lie is repre- 
sented as returning to Ms old companions; and, indeed, 
Shakspeare was too profound and faithful a moralist to 
retrieve the prince so easily — to break off suddenly his 
former associations. The lastinor transformation of his 
character must cost a struggle, and this is shown in a 
remarkable scene which I do not remember to have seen 
commented upon. Mr. Senior, the eminent writer' on 
political economy, in one of those fine critical papers with 
which he followed the successive appearance of the Wa- 
verley Novels, in remarking upon that rare power dis- 
played by Shakspeare and Scott — and by few else — of 
combining the comic with the tragic element, observes 
that no tragedian except Shakspeare has ventured to 
make a king's son remember that ^^ poor creature, small 
beer.''* This occurs in the scene to which I have just 
alluded, as disclosing the struggle between the prince's 
better nature and the companionship he felt to be un- 
worthy of it. The scene is with Poins, the most gentle- 
manly and least unfit of his associates. The prince says, 
" Trust me, I am exceeding weary." It was, doubtless, 
weariness of the heart — self- dissatisfaction — though he 
does not there say so. When Poins replies, ''Is it come 
to that ? I had thought weariness durst not have attacked 
one of so high blood;" the prince adds, ''Faith it doth 
me, though it discolours the complexion of my greatness 
to acknowledge it. Doth it not show vilely in me to 



* Lockhart's Life of Scott, vol. v. p. 247. It appears that Mr. Se- 
nior's articles on the Waverley Novels were begun in a periodical called 
the London Review, which soon failed. They were continued in the 
Quarterly Review. W. B. R. 



LECTURE SEVENTH. 



desire small beer ? * * * In troth, I do now remem- 
ber the poor creature, small beer. But, indeed, these 
humble considerations make me out of love with my 
greatness.'^ And then he runs on with a good deal of 
extravagance to show the mean things he was famihar 
with, avowing low propensities at the very time that what 
he truly wants is to give utterance to the better and the 
deeper feelings his heart is full of, but from which he is 
restrained by the painful misgiving that it would be 
thought unreal and insincere, because so unlike himself as 
he was known to these companions. Poins says, " How 
ill it follows, after you have laboured so hard, you should 
talk so idly. Tell me how many good young princes 
would do so, their fathers lying so sick as yours is.'^ He 
answers, ^^ Shall I tell thee one thing, Poins ? Why, I 
tell thee it is not meet that I should be sad, now my 
father is sick ; albeit, I could tell to thee, (as to me it 
pleases me, for fault of a better, to call my friend,) I 
could be sad, and sad indeed, too.'^ 

Poins's remark, " Yery hardly on such a subject,'^ pro- 
vokes him to express more of his feelings : 

^' By this hand, thou thinkest me as far in the devil's 
book as thou and Falstaff, for obduracy and persistency. 
Let the end try the man. But I tell thee, my heart 
bleeds inwardly that my father is so sick ; and, keeping 
such vile company as thou art, hath in reason taken from 
me all ostentation of sorrow. * * What wouldst thou 
think of me if I should weep ?" 

When Poins says, '•'■ I should think thee a most 
princely hypocrite," the prince adds, ^^It would be 
every man's thought : and thou art a blessed fellow to 
think as every man thinks ; never a man's thought in the 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FIFTH. 237 



world keeps the roadway better than thine ; — every man 
would think me an hypocrite indeed/^ 

The conflict is this : — ^he has become so entangled that 
he cannot suffer his better nature to take its course, from 
an apprehension of what would most offend a disposition 
like his. He would, therefore, expose himself to be con- 
demned as worse than he really is, rather than to be 
thought not so good as he might appear to be. Accord- 
ingly, he tries to turn away from seriousness to his old 
habits of diversion; but the sport is now laborious to 
him, and grave thoughts intrude in the midst of it, for 
he says: ^'We played the fools with the time, and the 
spirits of the wise sit in the clouds and mock us.^^ 

And when report is made to him — 

" The king your father is at "Westminster, 
And there are twenty weak and wearied posts 
Come from the North," 

he casts off in an instant the bonds of his companionship 
at the approach of the dangers of a second conspiracy 
against his father's throne : 

" By heaven, Poins, I feel me much to blame 
So idly to profane the precious time ; 
When tempest of commotion, like the south 
Borne with black vapour, doth begin to melt, 
And drop upon our bare unarmed heads. 
Give me my sword, and cloak : — Falstaflf, good-night." 

This is Prince Hal's last good-night to his boon com- 
panion. When they next meet it is as king and subject, 
and when the unchangeable impudence with which Fal- 
staff approaches Henry the Fifth, in the midst of the 
royal retinue, is rebuked and repulsed with stern but not 



LECTURE SEVENTH. 



cruel severity. It is a passage in the drama of historical 
interest^ as closing forever that levity of life which, ac- 
cording to common tradition, Henry had indulged. 

The reign of Henry the Fifth was signalized at the 
outset by a magnanimous policy. Besides the funeral 
honours to the memory of Richard the Second, he set at 
liberty the representative of the strict lineal succession to 
the crown, and thus converted a competitor into a friend. 
His policy — ^if policy it is to be called — was to plant the 
throne on the affections of the nation — ^the nobles and the 
people. In the only case of conspiracy which threatened 
the security of his reign, he is finely represented by 
Shakspeare as extorting from the mouths of the conspir- 
ing nobles themselves their own condemnation, so that 
justice is made to appear almost self-administrant. 

The great business of the reign was the war with 
France. Reserving the consideration of that war chiefly 
for the next lecture, I shall now treat it only in its con- 
nection with the character of Henry the Fifth. He re- 
vives the old claim of Edward the Third to the crown of 
France, and renews hostilities which had not been settled 
by any definite pacification. In doing so, he sought the 
advice of his highest and wisest counsellors ; and, in ask- 
ing the Primate of England to pronounce opinion on 
the claim, he forewarns him of the awful responsibility 
of his advice : 

" For God doth know how many, now in health, 
Shall drop their blood in approbation 
Of what your reverence shall incite us to : 
Therefore take heed how you impawn our person, 
How you awake the sleeping sword of war : 
We charge you in the name of God take heed : 
For never two such kingdoms did contend 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE FIFTH. 



"Without much fall of blood ; whose guiltless drops 
Are every one a wo, a sore complaint 
'Gainst him whose wrongs give edge unto the swords 
That make such waste in brief mortality/'* 

I need not occupy you witli tlie course of that invasion 
from the landing of Henry's army near Harfleur to one 
of the greatest of England's victories — the battle of Agin- 
court. Shakspeare has indicated the unanimity of the 
national feeling in this war and the universal allegiance 
to the king^ by introducing among the soldiers^ not only 
Englishmen, but the Welsh and Irish and Scotch, so as 
to make it a great British movement against a continental 
power. He has also shown the popular character of the 
war and of the sovereign, by giving considerable promi- 
nence, not merely to the nobles, but to commoners ; and, 
indeed, to the common soldiers. If the freedom of 
Henry's early life had a perilous tendency to licentious- 
ness, it gave him, on the other hand, large sympathies 
with his fellow-men and a power of dealing with humanity 

* It was, besides, in pursuance of his father's dying advice : 
"Though thou stand'st more sure than I could do. 
Thou art not firm enough, since griefs are green; 
And all thy friends, which thou must make thy friends, 
Have but their stings and teeth newly ta'en out, 
By whose fell working I was first advanci^d. 
And by whose power I well might lodge a fear 
To be again displaced ; which to avoid, 
I cut them off"; and had a purpose now 
To lead out many to the Holy Land ; 
Lest rest and lying still might make them look 
Too near unto my state. Therefore, my Harry, 
Be it thy course to busy giddy minds 
With foreign quarrels ; that action hence borne out, 
May waste the memory of the former days." W. B. R. 



240 LECTURE SEVENTH. 



in a generous and liberal spirit, wMcli secured him the 
hearts of his soldiers. His intercourse with them is one 
of the points of description in that deservedly famous 
picture of the eve of the battle of Agincourt in the chorus 
of the fourth act : 



The poor condemned English, 



Like sacrifices, by their watchful fires, 

Sit patiently, and inly ruminate 

The morning's danger ; and their gesture sad 

Investing lank, lean cheeks, and warworn coats, 

Presenteth them unto the gazing moon 

So many horrid ghosts. Oh, now who will behold 

The royal captain of this ruin'd band, 

Walking from watch to watch, from tent to tent, 

Let him cry — Praise and glory on his head ! 

For forth he goes, and visits all his host. 

Bids them good-morrow, with a modest smile ; 

And calls them — brothers, friends, and countrymen. 

Upon his royal face there is no note 

How dread an army hath enrounded him ; 

Nor doth he dedicate one jot of colour 

Unto the weary and all-watched night : 

But freshly looks, and overbears attaint 

With cheerful semblance and sweet majesty; 

That every wretch, pining and pale before, 

Beholding him, plucks comfort from his looks ; 

A largess universal, like the sun. 

His liberal eye doth give to every one. 

Thawing cold fear." * 

* Campbell, the poet, in the preface to his edition of Shakspeare, 
says : 

" The description of the night before the battle of Agincourt will be 
repeated by the youth of England when our children's children shall 
be gray with age. It was said of ^schylus that he composed his 
* Seven Chiefs against Thebes' under the inspiration of Mars himself. 
If ' Henry the Fifth' had been written for the Greeks, the same might 
have been said of it." W. B. R. 



THE KEIGN OF HENRY THE FIFTH. 241 



The position of Henry's army was critically dangerous. 
Outnumbered^ enfeebled by disease and fatigue^ and badly 
supplied^ tbey were kept in good discipline and in good 
heart by tbe half-tbougbtful, balf-jocund confidence of 
their sovereign. In the scenes before and at the battle, 
Shakspeare shows in action the finest conception of a 
great general, the happy warrior — he 

" Who doom'd to go in company with Pain 
And Fear and Bloodshed, miserable train ! 
Turns his necessity to glorious gain ; 
In face of these doth exercise a power 
Which is our human nature's highest dower ; 
Controls them and subdues, transmutes, bereaves 
Of their bad influence, and their good receives."*" 

An historical event is dramatized when the king, over- 
hearing Westmoreland's wish — 

** Oh, that we now had here 
But one ten thousand of those men in England 
That do no work to-day I" 



"What's he that wishes so ? 
My cousin Westmoreland ? — No, my fair cousin : 
If we are mark'd to die, we are enough 
To do our country loss ,• and if to live, 
The fewer men, the greater share of honour." 

Again, when, at early morn, he greets his brothers 
with such fine cheerfulness and courtesy — 

" Gloster, 'tis true that we are in great danger; 
The greater therefore should our courage be. 
Good morrow, brother Bedford !" 

* Wordsworth's " Character of the Happy Warrior." 
16 



242 LECTURE SEVENTH. 



And what can be more toucliingly beautiful than the 
respectful and affectionate greeting to the white hairs of 
that fine old soldier, Erpingham ? — 

" Good morrow, old Sir Thomas Erpingham ! 
A good soft pillow for that good white head, 
Were better than a churlish turf of France." 

And when the old knight takes his leave, saying — 
" The Lord in heaven bless thee, noble Harry !" — 

the king's cordial response is — 

" God-a mercy, old heart ! thou speakest cheerfully." 

In his season of the highest peril the spirit of Prince 
Hal seems to animate the king, and it is in the mood of 
lighter-hearted days, that he answers the message of tha 
Constable of France — 

*'* Why should they mock poor fellows thus ? 
The man that once did seU the lion's skin 
While the beast lived, was killed with hunting him. 
And many of our bodies shall, no doubt. 
Find native graves ; upon the which, I trust. 
Shall witness live in brass of this day's work. 
Tell the constable 

We are but warrior's for the working day : 
Our gayness and our gilt are all besmirch'd 
With rainy marching in the painful field ; 
There's not a piece of feather in our host, 
(Good argument, I hope, we shall not fly,) 
And time hath worn us into slovenry : 
But, by the mass, our hearts are in th^ trim ; 
And my poor soldiers tell me yet ere night 
They'll be in fresher robes." 

The battle was fought; and, at no great distance from the 
field of Cressy, the victory of Agincourt was won. I 



THE KEIGN OF HENRY THE FIFTH. 243 



cannot, of course, take time to dwell on tlie particulars 
of it ; to speak of the immense loss of life to tlie nobility 
of France; the consequence of their impetuous but ill- 
directed valour. Nor can I more than mention Henry's 
stern order — let us hope it was unavoidable — for the 
slaughter of the French prisoners. One incident alone 
I must refer to as finely illustrative of that period of 
England's history; and it is described in one of the beau- 
tiful passages of poetic description with which the play 
abounds — the description of the deaths of York and Suf- 
folk. After the battle, the king inquires whether his 
cousin, the Duke of York, survives : 

" Lives he, good uncle ? Thrice, within this hour, 
I saw him down ; thrice up again and fighting; 
From helmet to the spur, all blood he was." 

Exeter answers — 

" In which array (brave soldier) doth he lie, 
Larding the plain ; and by his bloody side 
(Yoke-fellow to his honour-owing wounds) 
The noble Earl of Suffolk also lies. 
Suffolk first died ; and York, all haggled over. 
Comes to him, where in gore he lay insteep'd, 
And takes him by the beard ; kisses the gashes 
That bloodily did yawn upon his face ; 
And cries aloud — * Tarry, dear cousin Suffolk ! 
My soul shaU thine keep company to heaven : 
Tarry, sweet soul, for mine, then fly abreast; 
As, in this glorious and well-foughten field 
We kept together in our chivalry !' 
Upon these words, I came and cheer'd him up : 
He smiled me in the face, raught me his hand, 
And, with a feeble gripe, says — ' Dear my lord, 
Commend my service to my sovereign.' 
So did he turn, and over Suffolk's neck 



244 LECTURE SEVENTH. 



He threw his wounded arm, and kiss'd his lips ; 
And so, espoused to death, with blood he seal'd 
A testament of noble-ending love." 

This description is an image of the English nobility ; 
not discordant, but " keeping together in their chivalry" 
in the hour of battle and of death, and uttering with their 
last breath dutiful and affectionate loyalty to that sove- 
reign, whose sway gave glory and harmony to the nation. 

Intending this drama as a kind of triumphal song, 
Shakspeare has carried it, not as usual on to the monarch's 
death, but to the happy ending of the marriage of Henry 
the Fifth to Katharine of France, the daughter of King 
Charles. The great achievement of the war was the treaty 
stipulation for the permanent union of the crowns of Eng- 
land and France. The subjugation of the French was 
partial and of short duration; and the next page of his- 
tory that we have to turn to, will show how the independ- 
ence of France found its wondrous redemption by the 
splendid heroism of Joan of Arc, 



LECTURE Yin.* 

^t Seigtt of fenrg i^t %M}^, 

The treaty of Troyes — Its details — The last hours of Henry the Fifth 
— His intended crusade — Hume's comments — Henry the Sixth an 
infant — His reign and these "Chronicle-Plays" unpromising sub- 
jects — Genuineness of the plays — The Minority — The French wars — 
State of France — The Regent Bedford — The Siege of Orleans — Joan 
of Arc — Various criticisms on her character — Her sincerity — 
Imputed witchcraft — Defective education — Her influence — Relief 
of Orleans — Coronation of the king at Rheims — Exemption of 
Domremy — Capture of the Maid — Her trial and examination — Her 
martyrdom — Cardinal Beaufort and the Bishop of Beauvais — The 
cardinal's death — Statue of the Maid at Versailles — Death of the 
Duke of Bedford — His monument — Magnanimity of Louis the 
Eleventh. 

In concluding the last lecture, I pointed your attention 
to tlie fact tliat Shakspeare, in order to preserve unbroken 
the triumphant tone of the drama of Henry the Fifth, did 
not bring it down to the monarch's death. The historical 
illustration which the play furnished us, ended with the 
close of Henry's campaign in France and his marriage 
with Katharine. The war waged by England against 
France extended over a period of about one hundred and 
twenty years, broken, indeed, by various truces and inter- 
ruptions; and at length, some eighty years after its 



'^ February 15th, 1847. 

245 



246 LECTURE EIGHTH. 



origin^ it was settled^ to all appearance permanently, by 
the treaty which the victory of Agincourt enabled the 
English monarch to exact. The treaty of Troyes, which 
was concluded in 1420, was such a treaty as a conqueror 
negotiates, or rather dictates, in the confident strength 
of recent victory. It did not absolutely depose the 
French king; but, transferring the royal power really 
into the hands of the conqueror, it provided that, on the 
death of Charles the Sixth, the crown should pass to 
Henry the Fifth and his heirs. The union of the crowns 
of the two great monarchies was a proud achievement ; 
but it proved no more than a splendid dream of vain am- 
bition. It seemed as if, by the subversion of its consti- 
tutional law of succession, the ancient dynasty of France 
had now reached the end of its thousand-year life, and 
that the sceptre of Clovis was to be forever broken, when 
it fell from the hands of the feeble Charles. It has been 
well said by Arnold in his Lectures on Modern History, 
that — ''When our object is to reproduce to ourselves, so far 
as is possible, the very life of the period we are studying, 
minute particulars help us to do this ; nay, the very for- 
mal enunciation of titles, and the specification of towns 
and districts in their legal style, help to realize the time 
to us, if it be only from their very particularity. Every 
common historian records the substance of the treaty by 
which the succession to the crown of France was given 
to Henry the Fifth ; but the treaty itself, or the English 
version of it which Henry sent over to England to be 
proclaimed there, gives a far more lively impression of 
the triumphant state of the great conqueror, and the 
utter weakness of the poor French king, Charles the 
Sixth, in the ostentatious care taken to provide for the 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 247 



recognition of his formal title during his lifetime, while 
all real power is ceded to Henry, and provision is made 
for the perpetual union hereafter of the two kingdoms 
under his sole government/'* 

The English king was in the full vigour of his days, 
the prime of his manhood just past, and the splendour of 
his reign seemed to be shining forth upon some glorious 
future, with the united diadem of France and England 
glittering on his brow. But, in less than two years, he 
found himself to be a dying man. Having given his 
death-bed injunctions for the administration of the realm 
and for the guardianship of his infant child, he spent his 
last hours in devotional exercises ; and, as the penitential 
psalms were read, when he heard the verse — "Build thou 
the walls of Jerusalem,' ' he interrupted them to declare, 
as a dying man, that it had been his intention to visit 
Palestine and free the Holy City from the Saracens. It 
is at once very easy and very characteristic for an histo- 
rian like Hume to add the comment — "So ingenious are 
men in deceiving themselves, that Henry forgot in these 
moments all the blood spilt by his ambition, and received 
comfort from the late feeble resolve, which, as the mode 
of these enterprises was now past, he certainly would 
never have carried into execution.'^f The mode of these 
enterprises was, indeed, past; but, at the time, it was not 
known to be, and the whole reflection seems to me a piece 
of most unreal moralizing. It is the malice of skepticism 
aping the modesty and the candour of piety; and it is 
well worth remarking that, while Mr. Hume is confident 



* Arnold's Lectures on Modern History, lect. i. p. 98, (Amer. ed.) 
f History of England, vol. iv. p. 73. 



248 LECTURE EIGHTH. 



enough in his speculation, to pronounce, upon no better 
authority, that Henry never would have carried his inten- 
tion into execution, later historical research has brought 
to light documentary proof, which establishes the sincerity 
of his dying words. Immediately after the treaty of 
Troyes, a Flemish knight, who was a councillor to Philip 
the Good, of Burgundy, and had been an ambassador to 
the English king, was sent by Henry and the Duke of 
Burgundy upon a secret mission to the Holy Land. The 
mission was actually performed, and with success; he 
made a military survey of the coasts and defences of 
Egypt and Syria; and the two copies of this survey, 
intended, one for the King of England, and the other for 
the Duke of Burgundy, are both in existence. Accord- 
ingly, if Mr. Hume, in absence of all evidence and know- 
ledge, had argued, not from his theory of the universal 
hypocrisy of all pious profession of other times, but more 
wisely, as well as charitably, from the possible sincerity 
of a dying man's declaration, he would have been much 
nearer the truth. 

So far from its being reasonable to scoff at Henry's 
declaration of his purposed crusade as a self-delusion and 
mockery, it is not only sustained by documentary evidence 
of the reality of his intention, but we can well believe 
that a spirit so ardent and active as his, after having 
achieved, while yet a young man, enough to satisfy a 
large ambition in the way of worldly conquest, should 
have turned his thoughts to what was esteemed a holy 
war. Having won the crown of France, and being con- 
federate with the greatest of the French nobles, the Duke 
of Burgundy, who also in his ducal power was almost a 
bovereign, Henry may well have felt that it became him 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 249 



to fulfil the unaccomplislied purpose of tis father. Had 
this crusade been carried into effect^ it might have given 
to Eastern Europe security from Turkish invasion a cen- 
tury earlier than it was obtained ; and the tranquillity of 
Christendom might have been saved from the alarm^ which 
was created by the successive, and well-nigh successful, 
sieges of Vienna by the Turks. 

On the death of Henry the Fifth, the succession pass- 
ing to his only child, Henry of Windsor — the son of an 
English father and a French mother, an infant of no 
more than nine months old — the youngest successor that 
ever had come to the English throne was to wear the crown 
of both France and England. One of the old chroniclers 
prefaces the reign of Henry the Sixth by saying that — 
" The pretty hands that could not feed himself, were yet 
made capable to wield a sceptre; and he that was behold- 
ing to nurses for milk, did, nevertheless, distribute the 
sustenance of law and justice to so great and warlike 
nations.'^* Two nations, and the proud and mighty 
nobles of two countries, did obeisance to the baby brow 
of Henry the Sixth ; but, when the royal child grew to 
manhood, he lived to learn, by bitter experience, the 
misery of that royalty, which his forefathers had triumph- 
antly transmitted to him. The career that was before the 
poor child was calamity and disgrace in foreign war, dis- 
cord and bloody strife at home, disaster in almost every 
variety, and, at last, a violent death. 

Before proceeding to the consideration of the reign of 
Henry the Sixth, let me say that it is a most unpromising 



* Speed, as quoted in Southey's Naval History of England, vol. ii. 
p. 58. 



250 LECTURE EIGHTH. 



subject for us in this course. It is for several reasons. 
His long reign, for it was of near forty years' duration, 
was confusion and turmoil from the beginning to the very 
end of it. It was a weary period of danger and distress, 
but not of that description of suffering wbicb often serves 
to develop heroic character, and cultivate lofty and virtu- 
ous emotions. Passing from the reign of Henry of Mon- 
mouth to that of Henry of Windsor, you see every thing 
co-operating to convert unanimity into discord, and not 
only to produce distraction, but to degrade the national 
enthusiasm and prostrate the character of the kingdom. 
The splendid achievement of foreign victory is changed 
for defeat and ignominy, and the record of the rest of the 
reign is reeking with the blood of civil slaughter. An- 
other reason for the unpromising character of the subject 
is, that the history of the reign of Henry the Sixth is 
well-nigh in as great confusion as the reign itself, so that 
it becomes most difficult to trace distinctly and satisfac- 
torily the course of events, or even to form a conception 
of the characters and spirit of the times ; and further- 
more, if we seek for personal interest in the characters of 
those who flourished — or rather let me say of such distress- 
ful times, who lived — then, it is hard to discover, who is 
entitled to sympathy and respect, and who is worthy of 
condemnation and hatred. There is a cloud of names 
belonging to that period, but so far as one's feelings are 
concerned, they seem to be names and nothing more. It 
is difficult to find one personage, either male or female, 
among them, in whose fortunes or character one can take 
any deep interest. This is owing chiefly, I suppose, to 
the general obscurity which hangs over the reign of 
Henry the Sixth, and prevents our forming any thing 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 251 



like a distinct conception of tte cliaracters of the men of 
the times or of the principles of action in the events. 

Again, there is another reason which affects the interest 
in this reign, at least for our present purposes, and that 
is the manifest inferiority of the dramas Shakspeare has 
devoted to it, when compared with his other ''■ Chronicle- 
Plays." It is that very inferiority which has made the 
authorship of the three parts of Henry the Sixth a ques- 
tion; and it is difficult to believe them the produc- 
tions of the same poetic genius that gave to English 
history and English poetry the other historical plays which 
hear a stamp that no one can mistake. The question 
whether or no Shakspeare was the author of the three 
parts of Henry the Sixth, is a literary question not be- 
longing to my present course ; and, while I do not enter 
upon it, I cannot help lamenting that there is such griev- 
ous inferiority in these three plays, in which I fear I can- 
not find a passage furnishing valuable historical illustra- 
tion, or of such poetic excellence, that I should desire to 
repeat it to you. The chief value of the poet's historical 
illustration is, that it gives unity to the apparent incon- 
sistencies of human character, and also to a multitude of 
events ; it helps us to comprehend the facts, because, dis- 
connected as they may be, and therefore unimpressive, 
they are put into order and harmony by the power of the 
imagination. Unfortunately, it is just at the period of 
English history when we should need this assistance, that 
it fails us; for really these three parts of Henry the 
Sixth are nearly as confused as the literal history of the 
times ; and if the lamp of philosophic history is shining 
very feebly and unsteadily in the prose, the light of poetry 
is equally dim in these dramas. I am sure that I could 



252 LECTURE EIGHTH. 



not interest you in retailing the military vicissitudes of 
this reign — the alternations of victory and defeat, or the 
dark and obscure schemes of rival factions ; and yet, what 
else is there in the history of the reign ? So that we 
have before us, I apprehend, not only a difficult, but (I 
am inclined to believe) almost an impossible, subject. 

From four of Shakspeare's plays, the Richard the 
Second, the two parts of Henry the Fourth, and Henry the 
Fifth, we have been enabled to draw historical illustration 
of the ascendency of the Lancastrian kings — the rise and 
progress of the Plantagenet family, from the time when 
Hichard threw down his warder in the lists at Coventry, to 
the period of the highest glory of the race on the field of 
Agincourt. Four plays, attributed to Shakspeare, are given 
to the sequel of the decline and fall of the Lancastrians, 
and the rising fortunes and dominion of the house of York. 

The reign of Henry the Sixth may be divided, in 
order to assist the mind in taking a view of it, into two 
periods 3 the first, chiefly during his minority, being oc- 
cupied with the continuance and conclusion of the war 
in France, and the other with the civil wars of the 
houses of York and Lancaster. The first of these forms 
the subject of the First Part of Henry the Sixth, 
which opens with the funeral of Henry the Fifth. 
This opening is intended, it has been suggested, to show 
that the death of that king, who was the conqueror of 
France and the idol of England, — who, by his extraordi- 
nary talents and energy, obliterated almost the memory 
of the circumstances under which his father obtained the 
throne, — was the starting-point of a long period of error 
and misfortune, during which France was lost, and Eng- 
land torn to pieces by civil war. By way of showing the 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 253 



irreparable loss the nation suffered in the death of Henry 
the Fifth, and as a dramatic anticipation of later events, 
the nobles and princes of the blood, to whom were com- 
mitted the management of the kingdom and guardianship 
of his infant son, are represented as beginning their dis- 
putes over the bier of their deceased sovereign. The 
success which had attended the military career of Henry 
the Fifth in his invasion of France, did not, immediately 
after his death, fail his countrymen. The Duke of Bed- 
ford, as Regent, prosecuted the war, and it proved no less 
to him a career of victory. Low as the power of France 
was reduced by the battle of Agincourt and the treaty of 
Troyes, it was destined to sink still lower before the un- 
abated strength of the great generals of Henry the Fifth, 
Bedford, and Salisbury, and Talbot, strengthened too, as 
they were, by the alliance of the Duke of Burgundy. The 
tide of victory and conquest continued to set in the same 
direction. The poor half-crazed, or more than half-crazed, 
French king, Charles the Sixth, had quickly followed 
Henry the Fifth to the grave, and his son, afterwards 
Charles the Seventh, was scarcely recognised, even with 
the title of dauphin. His adherents, discomfited wherever 
encountered, were driven from a large portion of their 
country; Paris was in the occupation of the new dynasty; 
and the whole Burgundian people, almost a nation in 
themselves, had withdrawn their allegiance from the an- 
cient race of the Capetian kings, and were the willing 
subjects of the English infant, whom the fortune of war 
had placed on the throne of France. The hope of inde- 
pendence was nearly extinct; the might of the island- 
strangers, thus far irresistible, had little more to do in 
fulfilling the work of subjugation ; and France was sunk 



254 LECTURE EIGHTH. 



SO low as if to give the greater splendour to that wondrous 
restoration which was to be achieved by a poor, unlettered 
peasant girl.* 

The course of English conquest in France seemed to be 
drawing to its completion. It remained to carry the war 
into the country beyond the Loire, and there to extin- 
guish the last hopes of French independence. The Re- 
gent Bedford added fresh troops to an army that was 
growing almost veteran on the soil of France, and being 
strongly reinforced by the Duke of Burgundy, sent a large 
force, under the command of the Earl of Salisbury, to 
take the city of Orleans, the possession of which was 
important, as commanding the passage of the Loire and 
the entrance into the southern provinces. If Orleans 
should be taken, the troops of Bedford and of Burgundy 
could enter without hinderance into the open country; and 
nothing but the mountains of Auvergne could shelter the 
dauphin, if he ventured, with his small court and reduced 
army, to remain on the soil of his native country. At the 



* There is a striking passage of De Serres, quoted in a note to 
Southey's Joan of Arc, and requoted in Creasy's "Battles," in the 
chapter on the Battle of Orleans : " In sooth, the estate of France 
was then most miserable. There appeared nothing but a horrible face, 
confusion, poverty, desolation, solitarinesse and feare. The lean and 
bare labourers in the country did terrifie even theeves themselves, who 
had nothing left them to spoile but the carkasses of these poore mi- 
serable creatures, wandering up and down like ghostes drawne out of 
their graves. The least farmes and hamlets were fortified by these 
robbers, English, Bourguegnons, and French, every one striving to do 
his worst ; all men-of-war were well agreed to spoile the countryman 
and merchant. Even the cattail, accustomed to the larume boll, the 
signe of the enemy's approach, would run home of themselves without 
any guide by this accustomed misery." "VV. B. R. 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 255 



advance of the English, army, the small towns surrendered 
after faint and ineffectual resistance ; and it was manifest 
to both nations^ that the issue of sovereignty on the one 
side, and of independence on the other, was to be decided 
at the city of Orleans. The day was near, when the long 
contest between the two kingdoms was to be decided for- 
ever, after having now been protracted through several 
generations ; for, from its origin, in the reign of Edward 
the Third, it had lasted about ninety years. The final 
judgment was to be made in a great national struggle, 
which the victories of neither Cressy nor Poictiers nor 
Agincourt could determine. The city of Orleans proved 
no easy conquest ; it was bravely defended, and Salisbury, 
the English commander, was killed during the siege. The 
siege was protracted for months, and at last converted into 
a blockade, to reduce the garrison by famine. With all 
their fortitude and endurance, and notwithstanding occa- 
sional relief, they were bound in more and more hope- 
lessly; and nothing short of an almost miraculous inter- 
position could save them, and with them the independence 
of their country. 

It was exactly in such unlooked-for relief, by an almost 
miraculous interposition, that succour did come to that 
beleaguered garrison and to France. It was at that crisis 
of the war that Joan of Arc came from the village of 
Domremy, on the borders of Lorraine, to rescue her 
country from foreign dominion, and to win for herself the 
imperishable title of the Maid of Orleans. 

The representation which is given of the character of 
Joan of Arc, in the First Part of Henry the Sixth, has been 
ingeniously defined and commented on by one of the latest 
and best editors of Shakspeare, and one of his most genial 



256 LECTURE EIGHTH. 



critics : lie says^ ^' We find her described in the chronicles 
under every form of vituperation — ^ a monstrous woman/ 
' a monster/ ' a romp/ ' a devilish witch and satanical en- 
chantress/ ^an organ of the devil/ She was the main 
instrument through which England had lost France ; and 
thus the people hated her memory. She claimed to be 
invested with supernatural powers^ and thus her name was 
not only execrated, but feared. Neither the patriotism 
nor the superstition of Shakspeare's age would have en- 
dured that the Pucelle should have been dismissed from 
the scene without vengeance taken on imagined crimes ; 
or that confession should not be made by her, which should 
exculpate the authors of her death. Shakspeare has con- 
ducted her history up to the point when she is handed 
over to the stake. Other writers would have burned her 
upon the scene, and the audience would have shouted 
with the same delight that they felt when the Barrabas 
of Marlowe was thrown into the cauldron. Shakspeare, 
following the historian, has made her utter a contradictory 
confession of one of the charges against her honour ; but 
he has taken care to show that the brutality of her Eng- 
lish persecutors forced from her an inconsistent avowal, if 
it did not a false one, for the purpose of averting a cruel 
and instant death. In the treatment which she received 
from York and Warwick, the poet has not exhibited one 
single circumstance that might excite sympathy for them. 
They are cold, and cruel, and insolent, because a defence- 
less creature, whom they had dreaded, is in their power. 
Her parting malediction has, as it appears to us, a special 
reference to the calamities which await the authors of her 

death : — 

*May never glorious sun reflex his beams 
Upon the country where you make abode ! 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 237 



But darkness and the gloomy shade of death 
Environ you.' 

" But in all the previous scenes, Sliakspeare has drawn 
the character of the Maid with an undisguised sympathy 
for her courage, her patriotism, her high intellect, and 
her enthusiasm. If she had been the defender of Eng- 
land, and not of France, the poet could not have invested 
her with higher attributes. It is in her mouth that he 
puts his choicest thoughts and his most musical verse 
It is she who says — 

' Glory is like a circle in the water, 
Which never ceaseth to enlarge itself, 
'Till by broad spreading it disperse to nought.' 

It is she who solicits the alliance of Burgundy in a strain 
of impassioned eloquence which belongs to one fighting in 
a high cause, with unconquerable trust, and winning over 
enemies by the firm resolves of a vigorous understanding 
and an unshaken will. The lines beginning — 

' Look on thy country — look on fertile France,' — 

might have given the tone to every thing that has been 
subsequently written in honor of the Maid.* It was his 



* I am at a loss to conjecture why these striking lines were not 
quoted in full, and add them in a note : 

" Look on thy country — look on fertile France, 
And see th© cities and the towns defaced 
By wasting ruin of the cruel foe ! 
As looks the mother on her lowly babe. 
When death doth close his tender-dying eyes, 
See, see the pining malady of France ; 
Behold the wounds, the most unnatural wounds, 
.17 



26» LECTURE ElOHTH. 



accurate knowledge of the springs of character which^ in 
so young a nian^ appears almost intuitive, that made 
Shakspeare adopt this delineation of Joan of Arc. He 
knew that, with all the influence of her supernatural pre- 
tension, this extraordinary woman could not have swayed 
the destinies of kingdoms, and moulded princes and war- 
riors to her will, unless she had been a person of very rare 
natural endowments. She was represented by the chroni- 
clers as a mere virago, a bold and shameless trull, a mon- 
ster, a witch, because they adopted the vulgar view of her 
character — the view, in truth, of those to whom she was 
opposed. They were rough soldiers, with all the virtues 
and all the vices of their age; the creatures of brute 
force; the champions, indeed, of chivalry; but with the 
brand upon them of all the selfish passions with which 
the highest deeds of chivalry were too invariably asso- 
ciated.''* 

This is all that can be said of the character of Joan of 
Arc as it appears in -the drama; and I have quoted Mr. 
Knight's comment at length, because I must confess that 
I have not been able to raise my admiration of the dra- 
matic treatment of her character so high. It has relative 
merit when compared to the treatment of the same subject 



Which thou thyself hast given her woful breast ! 
Oh ! turn thy edged sword another way ; 
Strike those that hurt, and hurt not those that help ! 
One drop of blood drawn from thy country's bosom 
Should grieve thee more than streams of foreign gore. 
Return thee, therefore, with a flood of tears, 
And wash away thy country's stained spots." W. B. R. 
* Charles Knight's Pictorial Shakspeare. Essay on Henry the 
Sixth and Richard the Third, p. 131. 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 259 



by the chroniclers, but it still falls, I think, very far short 
of what is justly due to beauty and purity and heroism of 
female character. I believe that the matured genius of 
the poet would have rendered such tribute in spite of 
national prejudice and universal injustice; and one cannot 
help lamenting that the subject fell into his hands only in 
the early and immature period of his imagination, to 
which the composition of the play, if it really was his, is 
ascribed. 

The dispassionate and unprejudiced estimate of the 
character of the Maid of Orleans belongs, however, to a 
later age than that of Shakspeare ; and the national ani- 
mosity which hindered it, has, in this case, died away, so 
that she is now a heroine to Englishmen, no less than to 
Frenchmen, and, indeed, a Christian heroine to all Chris- 
tendom.* The poets of Britain and of Grermany have 
drawn genuine inspiration from the memory of her life.*!* 
But let me notice that, while there is better spirit of jus- 
tice in dealing with her history, the modern judgment 
differs from that which was contemporary with her in 
this respect, that now the supernatural element is ex- 
cluded; and the question is, whether she was a sincere 
and self-deluded enthusiast, or a wilful impostor. For- 



* " Joan of Arc a heroine to Englishmen no less than to French- 
men." Arnold's Lectures, p. 96. 

■j- My brother was not familiar with the German language or its 
literature. His allusion is here, of course, to Schiller's " Maid of Or- 
leans," with which, accident had made him acquainted in the translation 
by the late William Peter, the British consul in Philadelphia — a gentle 
man who, during his residence in our city, gained many friends. He 
was a poet of no mean pretensions and a thorough scholar. My brother 
always spoke of him highly and aflfcctionately. W. B. R. 



260 LECTURE EIGHTH. 



merly, the supernatural character of her mission was not 
doubted, and the question then was, whether the mission 
was from above or below. By those who were hostile, her 
influence was not regarded as a cheat and an imposture, 
but it was witchcraft — it was sorcery and satanic inspira- 
tion — some strange dealing with the powers of darkness. 
The Duke of Grloucester issued a proclamation to reassure 
his soldiers against the incantations of the girl, and the 
Duke of Bedford spoke of her as a ^^ disciple and lymb of 
the fiend, that used false enchauntments and sorceries.'^ 
Nobody seems to have had a doubt that she possessed 
supernatural power; and the only question was, whether 
she brought with her ^^airs from heaven or blasts from 
hell.'' The severe rationalism of modern times has, how- 
ever, wholly changed this interpretation of her character 
and career, which may be admired and applauded, but 
must not be traced to any higher cause than such as serve 
to explain the ordinary afiairs of daily life. The modern 
mind recoils so violently from the admission of any thing 
more than mere human agency in the course of human 
afiairs, and the whole subject of belief in miraculous in- 
terposition is so completely systematized by formal trea- 
tises upon the "Evidences," which prescribe the occasions 
on which a miracle may reasonably and appropriately be re- 
cognised, that the achievements of the Maid of Orleans must 
find an explanation in some of the more customary principles 
of action. And yet I do not see that there is any great dif- 
ference between saying that she was supernaturally com- 
missioned to redeem her country from foreign dominion 
— a proposition which most minds would probably shrink 
from — and saying that, in the providential government of 
the world, it came into her heart to save France from 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 261 



Englisli conquest — a proposition whicli; perhaps, none 
would have any difficulty in admitting. 

Thisj at least, is clear : that what she said respecting 
her motives and the influences upon her mind, she did 
sincerely and steadfastly believe. No authority could shake, 
no sophistry could beguile, her deep convictions of what 
she held to be the truth, though the whole world should 
discredit it. She said she was commissioned by Heaven 
to raise the siege of Orleans and to crown Charles the 
Seventh at Rheims — two acts very remotely possible, nay, 
to human foresight, almost impracticable. And who was 
she that gave such wondrous promise ? A humble shep- 
herd girl, a mere child, (for she was but nineteen years 
old,) ignorant of the world — of every thing but the mighty 
workings of her own soul — unfriended, and, indeed, with 
no earthly support of any kind, with no mortal counte- 
nance to cheer and encourage ; and yet what this poor 
girl said she was commissioned to do, that exactly she 
did do. Her mission was fulfilled ] and while, perhaps, 
no one can confidently assert, or confidently deny, that 
her mission was, as she believed, divine, certainly in the 
world's history there is not to be found such an achieve- 
ment of unassisted human enthusiasm. 

The heroism of the Maid of Orleans has this surpassing 
merit : that it combines in beautiful proportions and har- 
mony the elements of piety, of patriotism, and of freedom. 
She was what she was from the love and the fear of God 
from love of her native land, and from the love of liberty. 
In childhood she tended her father's flocks. Her educa- 
tion was that of a peasant girl ; she could neither read 
nor write, but she could repeat her Pater Noster and Ave 
Maria. She was known as a kind-hearted girl, who would 



LECTURE EIGHTH. 



dutifully nurse the sick and help the wayfarer ; and acts 
of devotion were more congenial to her than the sports of 
childhood. At her trial — that trial which ended in her 
death and the eternal shame of her judges — the sacristan 
of the village church bore witness, that she was wont to 
chide him when he neglected to ring the church bells at 
the appointed hours of service, and to win him to more 
fidelity in his office. To her secluded home and her ap- 
prehensive spirit there came tidings — brought, no doubt, 
by many a weary wayfarer — of the evil that was besetting 
the monarchy of France. She heard with indignant 
loyalty, how her sovereign was, by a series of disasters, 
becoming a vassal ; how British invasion, with Burgun- 
dian alliance, was spoiling her native land. How it was 
that the thought came into her soul that she was to be an 
instrument to save her country and her king, no history 
can tell, no philosophy can explain ; and we must fain 
content ourselves, I suppose, with the poor theory that it 
was enthusiasm — political and religious enthusiasm com- 
bined, and working on an ardent imagination and a lofty 
spirit. It was her own belief that the canonized dead 
appeared to her ; that she saw the forms and ^' heard the 
voices of her guardian saints, calling on her to re-establish 
the throne of France and expel the English invaders." 
The apparitions began, she said, when she was thirteen 
years old, and they continued during several years. She 
beheld them at noonday, and in the open fields; majestic 
forms floated before her sight, and the sound of mysterious 
voices reached her ears. One awful form announced itself 
as an archangel ; and so strong and sincere was her faith 
in these appearances, that, on her trial, with that placid 
and Serene confidence which she displayed on that occa- 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 



sion, she said to her judges — " I saw him with my eyes 
as plainly as I see you now/^ And when further ques- 
tioned, she added — ''Yes, I do believe firmly, as firmly as I 
believe the Christian faith, and that God has redeemed us 
from the pains of hell, that thoso voices came from God 
and by his command.'' ' Animated by such faith, she 
went forth to inspire new zeal into the hearts of her faint- 
ing countrymen ; and it is a familiar story, how her pre- 
sence quickly proved a power of victory, and her voice 
kindled that hopeful courage, which gives a people their 
liberty and guards their independence. The enthusiasm 
that was caught from her by her countrymen at the same 
time struck terror and dismay into the hearts of their 
adversaries; her voice was the trumpet-signal of the 
restoration of her country's freedom; and it has been 
nobly said in those lines, which burst so finely from a 
youthful poet's heart — from the impassioned soul of 
Southey — 

" When she spake the trump was heard 
That echoed ominous o'er the streets of Rome, 
When the first Caesar tottered o'er the grave 
By freedom delved; — the trump whose chilling blast, 
On Marathon and on Platea's plain 
Scattered the Persian." 

In the almost incredibly short space of seven days after 
her arrival at Orleans, she raised the siege of the city; and, 
of those seven days, three were by her direction devoted to 
public prayer. The supernatural terror which had seized 
the English soldiers was so great, that, at the battle of 
Patay, they — among them no doubt were some of the 
veterans of Agincourt — fled in panic-struck confusion. 



264 LECTURE EIGHTH. 



The remaining promise of Joan of Arc was speedily ful- 
filled wlien tlie dauphin entered the city of Rheims in 
triumph^ and was crowned Charles the Seventh. During 
the coronation, the Maid of Orleans stood before the high 
altar of the cathedral, with her banner unfurled; and, 
afterwards, when asked on her trial — ^^Why was your 
banner thus honoured beyond all other banners?'^ she 
answered — " It had shared the danger ; it had a right to 
share the glory/ ^ 

It was a beautiful trait of female heroism that, while 
this extraordinary woman was not only displaying a daunt- 
less intrepidity in the hour of battle, and not only ani- 
mated the soldiers, but led them into the thickest of the 
fight, she refrained from staining her womanhood with 
the blood of even the enemies of her country.* The 
white banner which she bore in battle, and which was 
seen in her hands in the fiercest of it, she had taken, as 
she declared on her trial, on purpose to spare the sword 
and lance ; that she wished not to kill any one with her 
own hand, and that she never had. She wore, it is true, 
the old sword which was mysteriously obtained for her 
from the church-vault of St. Catherine at Fierbois, but 
only as a part of her suit of armour and for defence. 
Among the curious particulars of her story, one of the 
homely incidents which give such reality to our impres- 
sions of her life, was the use of it on one occasion as a 
bloodless weapon of offence. "When the sudden change 
in the fortune of war raised the spirits of the French sol- 



* How untrue, therefore, is Schiller's delineation of " The Maid :" 
he makes her bound by a row to kill, and never to give quarter. The 
crisis of her fate comes from an act of mercy. W. B. R. 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 265 



diers from tlieir depression, the excitement led to disor- 
ders whicli defied discipline. The Maid, encountering 
one of the riotous parties revelling in company with a 
worthless female camp-follower, beat them with the flat 
of her sword, so that the mysterious weapon broke in her 
hands. When this ill-omened accident was reported to 
the king, he said to her — '^ You ought to have taken a 
stout stick and laid that well on them, instead of risking 
the sword which came to you divinely, as you say.''* 

Orleans being relieved and Charles the Seventh crowned 
at Rheims, the Maid regarded her mission accomplished 
and her duty done. She sought release from her strange, 
unwomanly service. '^I wish,'' she said, "this gentle 
king would allow me to return to my father and mother, 
to keep my flocks and herds as before, and do all things 
as I was wont to do." This, let it be observed, was at 
the very height of her triumph and power; amid the 
splendour and attraction of such proud scenes, and amid 
the grateful honours rendered to her by king and cap- 
tains and courtiers, her thoughts travelled back to the 
simple life of her childhood and the secluded pastures of 
Lorraine. Her father and kinsfolk had come to witness 
her triumph, and gladly would the shepherd girl have 
gone back with them to her quiet home and the village 
church. She was, however, prevailed on by universal 
entreaty to forego her own wishes; but, while in her 

* Is there not some skepticism — an insinuated doubt — in this "As 
you say" of the king ? I wonder that my brother missed the chance of a 
fair criticism on Hume, who calls Charles the Seventh " the good Icing." 
Why, it is, indeed, not easy to say. History scarcely produces a cha- 
racter less entitled to this praise, and more in contrast with the heroism 
that rescued him. W. B. R. 



LECTURE EIGHTH. 



after career slie displayed tlie same courage in battle, it 
was observed tbat she seemed no longer to feel the same 
persuasion tbat sbe was acting at tbe command and under 
the guidance of Heaven. 

Another remarkable proof of tbe preservation of tbe 
simplicity and innocence of ber character is to be found 
in the fact, that sbe only did not solicit, but declined, all 
rewards ', all of royal favour that sbe asked was that the 
village of her birth should be thereafter exempt from all 
taxation. For three hundred years and more did this 
memorial of her services continue ; and, until the French 
Revolution ruptured so many historic associations, the 
stated return on the registry of taxes opposite to the 
name of the village of Domremy was in these words : 
^' Nothing on account of the Maiden.^^"^ 

Again, at another period of the war, did Joan of Arc 
determine to retire; but again was she persuaded to 
remain with the army ; and again and again in assaults 
and skirmishes was she distinguished by her accus- 
tomed valour. But her glorious career was drawing to 
its dark and tragic close ; so true is it, as has been elo- 
quently said, that — ^^ There is seldom a line of glory 
written upon the earth's face, but a line of suffering runs 
parallel with it ; and they that read the lustrous syllables 
of the one and stoop not to decipher the spotted and worn 
inscriptions of the other, get the least half of the lesson 
earth has to give.'' 

The death of Joan of Arc has a connection with Eng- 
lish history — an opprobrious connection • for upon that 
history it has left a reproach, which all the tide of time 

* " Neant a cause de la Pucelle." W. B. R. 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 267 



cannot wash away. The battle in wliicli she was taken 
prisoner was not with the English^ but with the Burgun- 
dians. In the course of a few months, however, she was 
purchased by the English of John of Luxemburg, whose 
prisoner she was, for ten thousand livres. When the 
news of the captivity of the Maid was received, Paris, 
still in the occupation of the English, was filled with 
rejoicing; the bells in the old towers of Notre-Dame were 
rung, and a solemn Te Deum and thanksgiving were cele- 
brated ; — all this because one woman was taken prisoner ; 
and, 0, shame ! the celebration was by the order of the 
Regent Bedford — he who, a few years before, had stood 
by the side of his heroic brother, King Henry the Fifth, 
on the perilous field of Agincourt, with an army outnum- 
bered, needy, and enfeebled, but not disheartened. 

Joan of Arc was placed in strict confinement ; she was 
loaded with fetters, and English archers kept guard over 
her. Her death was determined on ; but more than her 
death was needed. Her enemies were crafty as well as 
cruel; and their purpose was to dispel the popular feeling 
of awe which had given strength to her countrymen and 
struck terror to her enemies. It was by a subtle barba- 
rity that she was delivered over to an ecclesiastical tribu- 
nal for trial — the mockery of justice. The guilt of this 
proceeding rests upon both countries — England and 
France. With Englishmen did the trial originate, and 
by Frenchmen was it conducted. The Bishop of Beau- 
vais proved a ready instrument, and was appointed first 
judge ] another French ecclesiastic the second, and an- 
other discharged the function of accuser. Near one 
hundred doctors of theology were present to assist with 
their counsel ; and all this authority and learning were 



LECTURE EIGHTH. 



arrayed against a young, unlettered, and friendless peasant 
girl. She appeared in her military dress, but loaded with 
chains ; and during fifteen days was the torment of her 
examination continued, vexing the memory even of her 
innocent childhood. The mind is apt to be attracted in 
the history of Joan of Arc, chiefly, if not exclusively, by 
her amazing martial prowess ; but equally wonderful was 
the constancy displayed upon her trial. When we think 
of the deep sensibility of her nature, her ardent imagina- 
tion, her high-wrought enthusiasm, and memory fraught 
with such marvellous recollections, it is most wonderful 
to note the sober good sense and calm wisdom of her an- 
swers ; and, still more, the placid faith and beautiful cha- 
rity which shone through them.* 

She was asked whether she knew herself to be in the 
grace of God. It was a crafty and a murderous question, 
for it was framed in the hope of extorting an answer that 
should prove the sentence of her own condemnation. 
The malice of the question was baffled by the simplicity 
of her answer : — ^^ If I am not in the grace of God, I 
pray God it may be vouchsafed to me ; if I am, I pray 
God I may be preserved in it." A profound humility 
proved the highest wisdom. With undiminished malevo- 



* It was once my good fortune — a rare one in this country, where 
the book is not often met with — to read the examination of Marie 
Antoinette, the dethroned Queen of France, before the revolutionary 
tribunal — the questions and the answers as printed in the Moniteur. 
The original newspaper on its homely brownish paper as published, I 
presume, the next day, was before me. It brought the ghastly scene 
of her martyrdom more vividly to my mind than any elaborate elo- 
quence — from Burke down to Lamartine. It has been recalled to my 
memory by this examination of " La Pucelle." W. B. R. 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 



lence^ she was asked whether the saints of her visions 
hated the English nation; and when she replied — ^^They 
love whatever God loves^ and hate whatever he hates/ ^ 
the irritated inquisitor pursued her with the question — 
^' Does God^ then, hate the English V and her answer was 
— ^^ Whether God may love or hate the English, I know 
not ; but I do know that they shall be driven forth from 
this realm by the Ki^g of France — all but those who 
shall die in the field." It seems to me that there is 
nothing more impressive in her story than the simple 
serenity, the sagacity, as well as the piety of her answers, 
as will appear from a few of them : 

" When you took the banner, did you ask whether it 
would make you victorious in every battle?" "The 
Voices," answered she, " told me to take it without fear, 
and that God would help me." " Which gave the most 
help, you to the banner or the banner to you ?" " Whe- 
ther victory came from the banner or from me, it belonged 
to God alone." "Was the hope of victory founded on the 
banner or on yourself?" "It was founded on God, and 
naught besides." 

" If another person had borne it, would the same suc- 
cess have followed ?" " I cannot tell. I refer myself to 
God." 

"Why were you chosen sooner than another? " It was 
the pleasure of God that a simple maid should put the 
foes of the king to flight." 

" Were you not wont to say, to encourage the soldiers, 
that all the standards made in semblance of your own 
would be fortunate ?" " I used to say to them — ' Rush 
in boldly among the English !' and then I rushed in 
myself." 



270 LECTURE EIGHTH. 



The tones of innocence and truth could find no en- 
trance into the hearts of the ruthless judges who had fore- 
doomed her. The cruelty of her persecutors gave no 
respite even to the short and bitter time between her con- 
demnation for sorcery and heresy and the last hour when, 
in the market-place of Rouen, she was bound to the stake. 
The young and heroic brow which, during her whole life, 
had been bowed in frequent and faithful devotion, and 
which had been pressed by the helmet in her country's 
battles, was made to bear a mitre with the cruel and false 
inscriptions of — '^kelapsed heretic, apostate, idol- 
ater.'' While engaged in her last devotions she asked 
for a crucifix. There was none at hand, but an English 
soldier made a cross of rude form by breaking his stafi". This 
was the only act of mercy or pity which appears to have 
been shown to her by her English foes. The flames 
lapped her body, and the Saviour's name was the last 
word that was heard from her lips. 

Of this awful and inhuman tragedy the French Bishop 
of Beauvais was an official spectator, and so was the Eng- 
lish Bishop of Winchester. It was the last prelate — the 
Cardinal Beaufort — who, implacable even by the death of 
their victim, ordered the ashes and the bones of the 
^'heretic" to be gathered up and cast into the river 
Seine. And who was this Cardinal Beaufort, Bishop of 
Winchester? What was his life, and what the ending 
of it ? We have seen how the career of Joan of Arc was 
mysteriously turned from the simplicity and lowliness of 
her birth, and from the path of womanhood ; and now, in 
brief comparison, let us look at the life and death of the 
haughty ecclesiastic who exulted over her martyrdom. 

Henry Beaufort was a natural son of John of Gaunt, 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 271 



Duke of Lancaster, and brother^ therefore, of 'Henry tlie 
Fourth, and uncle of Henry the Fifth. Preferment in 
the church was not wanting to him, but it gave not 
enough to satisfy either his avarice or his ambition ; and 
he added political to ecclesiastical power. During the 
minority of Henry the Sixth, his aspiring and turbulent 
spirit was not the smallest element of disorder in those 
times. The tranquillity of the realm was broken by the 
quarrels and the rivalry of the Bishop of Winchester and 
the Duke of Gloucester; and the Regent Bedford was 
constrained to return to England to quell their contro- 
versy. The prelate was honoured with ecclesiastical dig- 
nities conferred by the pope ; he was made a cardinal, 
and appointed captain-general of a crusade against the 
followers of John Huss, in Bohemia. We have seen how 
the peaceful life of Joan of Arc was turned from its natu- 
ral course into the stormy channel of war; and so it is 
with this cardinal, the duty of whose life lay in the pacific 
duties of the church. But how different was the change ! 
She sought a soldier's life to defend her king and coun- 
try; and he, for aggression and religious persecution, 
levied his band of five thousand archers. She put away 
reward from herself, while he accumulated wealth that 
distinguished him as the "Rich Cardinal.^' She, even in 
battle, forebore staining her hand with blood ; he partici- 
pated in the fiery blood-shedding of her martyrdom ; and 
on his memory rests, too, the dark suspicion of having 
caused the treacherous murder of his kinsman, Gloucester. 
Joan of Arc perished in the bloom of early womanhood , 
but Beaufort lived not only the threescore years and ten, 
but to be an aged man of eighty years. She died a death 
of torture at the stake ; and, fixing her fading vision on 



272 LECTURE EIGHTH. 



the cross rudely and hastily made by a soldier's hand, 
gave up her spirit meekly in prayer. He died in his 
palace in his bed; perhaps it was "his. bed of the golden 
cloth of Damascus/' so gorgeous that he bequeathed it a 
legacy to the Queen of England ; and now that he had 
reached the mortal limit of his fourscore years of princely 
pomp and royal opulence, his restless spirit raised new 
hopes of ambitious regency upon the deaths of Bedford 
and Grloucester ; and, still more, the triple crown of the 
papacy was a distant vision to the eyes of the aged and 
aspiring cardinal. One of the chroniclers, upon the tes- 
timony of the chaplain who witnessed his last days, nar- 
rates that Beaufort on his death-bed uttered the miserable 
question — "Why should I die, having so much riches? 
If the whole realm would save my life, I am able either 
by policy to get it or by riches to buy it.'' And Shak- 
speare has wrought the history and tradition of Cardinal 
Beaufort's last hours into that awful scene of impenitent 
misery and terror upon a death-bed, where the meek and 
pious monarch, Henry the Sixth, is introduced, uttering 
over the dying man's struggles the words of piteous 
intercession : 

" thou eternal Mover of the heavens ! 
Look with a gentle eye upon this wretch ! 
Oh, beat away the busy meddling fiend 
That lays strong siege unto this wretch's soul, 
And from his bosom purge this black despair ! 
* * * * 

Lord cardinal, if thou thinkest on heaven's bliss, 
Hold up thy hand — make signal of thy hope — 
He dies, and makes no sign.* 

* The historical student is aware that there is " another side" even 
\n Cardinal Beaufort's case ; and that Doctor Lingard, the Roman 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 273 



The world that was not worthy of Joan of Arc while 
she lived, has striven to make some amends to her 
memory, against which the spirit of persecution has been 
revived only in the more devilish form of the ribald wit 
and blasphemy of Voltaire. On the spot where she was 
sacrificed, a monument has long stood to commemorate 
her character and national services. The poetic genius 
of Southey and of Schiller has celebrated her memory, 
and historians have reverently collected all the evidence 
of her story.* But, perhaps, the most beautiful tribute 



Catholic historiau, asserts that Shakspeare was all wrong, and was 
misled by prejudiced chroniclers, such as Hall ; and that the car- 
dinal's old age was devoted to pastoral duties and religious exercises. 
(Vol. iv. p. 83.) My brother, though evidently on the Shakspearian 
side of the question, did not bring out one of Beaufort's atrocities as 
strongly as he might have done. Lord Mahon, in his Quarterly 
Review essay, says, speaking of the Maid's execution : — " Several 
of the prelates and assessors had already withdrawn in horror from 
the sight, and others were melted into tears; but the Cardinal of Win- 
chester, still unmoved, gave orders that the ashes and bones of the 
heretic should be collected and cast into the Seine." On the vexed 
question of Beaufort's real guilt or innocence, I am incompetent to 
form an opinion; but, taking his death-bed horrors as truth, there 
are four lines at the close of the scene which, in charity, should be 
quoted. Warwick says — 

" So bad a death argues a monstrous life." 
To which the king gently answers — 

" Forbear to judge, for we are sinners all — 
Close up his eyes and draw the curtain close 
And let us all to meditation." W. B. R. 

* I find the following most recent tribute to the memory of "The 
Maid" in the little volume to which I have already more than once re- 
ferred in these notes : 

" I will add but one remark," says Professor Creasy, " on the cha- 
racter of the truest heroine that the world has ever seen. If any 

IS 



274 LECTURE EIGHTH. 



that has ever been paid to the memory of the Maid of 
Orleans, has been that, in our own day, of a sister woman 
and sister countrywoman by that daughter of the Bang 
of the French — the princess who, in the statue of Joan 
of Arc, has left a memorial that she shared the genius 
and the inspiration of Thorwaldsen or Canova. An Eng- 
lish writer has well said — 

" Who that has ever trodden the gorgeous galleries of 
Versailles, has not fondly lingered before that noble work 
of art — ^before that touching impersonation of the Chris- 
tian heroine — the head meekly bended, and the hands 
devoutly clasping the sword, in sign of the cross, but firm 
resolution imprinted on that mouth, and beaming from 
that lofty brow ? Whose thoughts, as he paused to gaze 
and gaze again, might not sometimes wander from old 
times to the present, and turn to the sculptress — sprung 
from the same royal lineage which Joan had risen in 
arms to restore — so highly gifted in talent, in fortunes, in 
hopes of happiness, yet doomed to an end so grievous and 
untimely ? Thus, the statue has grown to be a monu- 
ment, not only to the memory of the Maid, but to her 



person can be found in the present age who would join in the scoffs 
of Voltaire against the Maid of Orleans, and the heavenly voices by 
which she believed herself inspired, let him read the life of the wisest 
and best man that the heathen nations ever produced. Let him read 
of the heavenly voice by which Socrates believed himself to be con- 
stantly attended; which cautioned him on his way from the field of 
battle at Delium, and which, from his boyhood to the time of his death, 
visited him with un-^arthly warnings. Let the modest reader reflect 
upon this ; and then, unless he is prepared to term Socrates either fool 
01 impostor, let him not dare to deride or vilify Joan of Arc." Deci- 
sive Battles of the World, vol. ii. p. 101 : " The Battle of Orleans." 

^Y. B. R. 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 275 



own : thus, future generations in France — all those^ at 
least, who know how to prize either genius or goodness in 
woman — will love to blend together the two names — the 
female artist with the female warrior — 

Mary of Wurtemburg and Joan or Arc.''* 

The execution of the Maid of Orleans proved ineffec- 
tual in restoring the fortune of the EngUsh arms ; and, 
though the contest was protracted, neither the wise and 
strong regency of Bedford, nor the valour of Talbot, could 
save the conquests in France. The Duke of Burgundy 
broke off from the alliance with England, and returned 
to his allegiance to the French king. The fit and final 
catastrophe to a war which had lasted in all near one 
hundred and twenty years, was the expulsion of the Eng- 
lish. The original claim of the King of England to the 
French crown had no foundation in justice; and, happily 
for both nations, the independence of France was re-esta- 

* This is an extract from a most picturesque article in No. 138 of 
the Quarterly Review, now known to be by Lord Mahon — the present 
Earl Stanhope — and since separately published as his, in a popular 
form. Much of the materials, and, occasionally, passages of the lec- 
ture, are derived from this article; and I have not thought it worth 
while to distinguish them further than by this general acknowledg- 
ment. It occurs to me here to note, as this work is passing 
through the press, we have the intelligence that Earl Stanhope has 
recently — and it was one of his first acts on succeeding to his title — 
created a prize essay at Oxford on "English Historical Composition." 
At this time when a great deal of nonsense is talked and written on 
both sides of the Atlantic about "the cold shade of the aristocracy," 
it is pleasant to those who still think well of ancient institutions to 
find noblemen like Lord Stanhope and Lord Carlisle actively contri- 
buting to the cause of popular letters. W. B. R. 



276 LECTURE EIGHTH. 



blished, and tlie continental conquests of the Plantagenets 

ceased forever. 

During tliat war in France, tlie Duke of Bedford died 
— Ms regency unaccomplislied, but distinguislied for 
wisdom and ability; lie was buried in one of tbe old 
cathedrals of France, and a stately monument erected over 
bis body. 

It was said by an old cbronicler that, in tbe next 
Frencb reign, King Louis tbe Eleventh — '^By certain 
indiscreet persons was counselled to deface tbe tomb of 
tbe Duke of Bedford in tbe cathedral church of our Lady 
in Eouen, being told that it was a great dishonour both 
to the king and to the realm to see the enemy of his 
father and theirs have so solemn and rich memorial. He 
answered, saying. What honour shall it be to us or to 
you, to break this monument and to pull out of the 
ground the dead bones of him who, in his lifetime, 
neither my father nor your progenitors, with all their 
power, puissance, and friends, were not able to make flee 
one foot backward; but who, by his strength, wit, and 
policy, kept them all out of the principal dominions of the 
realm of France, and out of this noble and famous duchy 
of Normandy. Wherefore, I say, first — Grod have his 
soul, and let his body lie in rest, which, when he was 
alive, would have disquieted the proudest of all ; and, as 
for the tomb, I assure you it is not so decent or conve- 
nient as his honour and acts deserved, although it were 
much richer and more beautiful. ^^'^ 

This was a piece of generosity which one would hardly 



* Lingard cites for this surprising act of Louis the Eleventh, Stow, 
p. 475; Hall, 129. 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE SIXTH. 277 



have expected from a man so cold-hearted and unscrupu- 
lous as Louis the Eleventh ; and, as the incident is told 
in the simple language of the chronicler, it has a poetic 
aspect, and recalls — once scarce knows how — those simple 
lines of Coleridge which Walter Scott was fond of quoting : 

" The knight's bones are dust, 
And his good sword rust ; — 
His soul is with the saints, I trust."* 

It was my intention to have included in this lecture 
that part of the civil war which belongs to the reign of 
Henry the Sixth ; but the truth is, I have been glad to 
escape into the French history connected with that reign, 
and I could not forbear dwelling upon the story of Joan 
of Arc longer than I at first contemplated. 

The next lecture must, therefore, comprehend the sub- 
ject of the war of the houses of York and Lancaster from 
its origin to the end of the reign of Eichard the Third. 

* Christabel. Poetical Works, p. 276, Am. ed. 



LECTURE IX* 

Closing scenes of the Plantagenet dynasty — Want of interest in the 
War of the Roses — The question of genealogy — No actuating prin- 
ciple in the contest — Its obscurity — A series of bloody battles — 
Saintly character of the king — His solitary sadness — Loss of the 
French conquests — The Duke of SuflTolk — Popular tumult — Jack 
Cade — The Temple Garden — Richard of York and Somerset — The 
battle of St. Albans — The Earl of Warwick, the king-maker — 
Henry^s captivity — The Parliament — Margaret of Anjou — Her cha- 
racter — King Rene — Injustice of English writers to her memory — 
The battle of Wakefield — Two crowned Kings of England — The 
slaughter at Towton — Tewksbury — The queen — Sir Walter Scott's 
tribute to her — Political effects of the civil war — Death struggle of 
the military power of the nobles — The last of the barons — Cliflford — 
No feud among the people or vassals — The separation of the church 
from the conflict — Education — The foundation of Eton. 

The first part of the reign of Henry of Windsor 
being connected witli the close of the war against France, 
I was tempted, in the last lecture, to digress in some 
measure into French history, partly because one could 
hardly help expatiating on the splendid and sad story 
of that Christian heroine, the Maid of Orleans, and 
partly because I would fain escape, at least for a little 
while, from the unpromising and unsatisfactory subject 



* February 22d, 1847. 
278 



THE WARS OF THE ROSES. 279 



that must be encountered now — I mean the history of 
that hateful civil feud between the families of York and 
Lancaster^ which has nothing attractive in it save its 
pretty symbolical title of the " War of the Roses." The 
subject which I have now to treat of is the civil war be- 
tween the two branches of the Plantagenet family, from 
the origin of their contention down to the defeat and 
death of Richard the Third at the battle of Bosworth 
Field, when the body of that last of the Yorkists was 
stripped and thrown across a horse's back, like a slaugh- 
tered wild beast, besmeared with blood and dirt, and thus 
carried to an unhonoured burial at Leicester. So it was, 
that, after more than three centuries of majestic rule and 
after fourteen reigns, the dominion of the Plantagenet dy- 
nasty in England, the Saxon and the Norman race com- 
bined, passed away forever. 

Taken in its fullest extent, down to the battle of Bos- 
worth Field, this civil war occupied a period of thirty 
years, embracing what one of the old English chroniclers 
has entitled '^ the troublous season of King Henry the 
Sixth, the prosperous reign of King Edward the Fourth, 
the pitiful life of King Edward the Fifth, and the 
tragical doings of King Richard the Third." A strug- 
gle so protracted and so sanguinary as it was has not 
been without permanent political consequences, which I 
will endeavour to indicate in the course of this lecture ; 
but, however important were these remote results in the 
national progress of England, they do not give an interest 
to the story of the struggle itself. If the War of the 
Roses be considered by itself — separated, on the one hand, 
from the earlier events, with which it is morally connected 
by retribution for ancestral guilt, and, on the other hand, 



280 lecturj: ninth. 



from the later times^ in which unlooked-for consequences 
are seen — there cannot^ I think^ be found an era of his- 
tory more unsatisfactory. It is scarcely possible, it seems 
to me, to awaken in our minds any strong feeling on 
either side of this domestic warfare by the statement of 
the respective claims of the two parties. The particulars 
of the genealogical question are no sooner received into 
the mind than they are very apt to escape out of the me- 
mory. It is enough, however, to remember, for the pur- 
pose of understanding the issue, that both parties trace 
their claims back to a common ancestor, Edward the 
Third. There being no descendants from either the first 
or second son of that sovereign, the controversy lay be- 
tween the posterity of the third and fourth sons. The 
three Lancastrian kings, being descended from the fourth 
son, had occupied the throne for more than half a century, 
to the exclusion of the lineage of the third, to whom the 
rights of the Duke of Clarence had descended in due 
course of inheritance. 

ISTow, a judgment on the respective merits of the 
Yorkist and Lancastrian claims can only be formed after 
determining whether the law of the English monarchy 
is indefeasible, unalterable, hereditary right, or whether 
the rule of succession may undergo a change by the 
action of Parliament, as the great national council. His- 
torians, accordingly, are found with York or Lancaster 
predilections and prejudices, as they respectively incline 
to the theory of the absolute, hereditary right of the mo- 
narch, or to that of the supremacy of the Parliament. 
But, whatever be the merits of this question, they are not 
of such a nature as to inspire us with an interest in the 



THE WARS OF THE ROSES. 



war, for the sake of any principle involved in it. And 
this is so, not because the modern mind, or our republican 
minds, prevent our entering into the spirit of this an- 
cient commotion of the monarchy, but because the par- 
ties to the war do not appear themselves to have felt the 
respective principles as great actuating impulses. There 
is a great deal to show that the war was a contest of pas- 
sion far more than of principle. The theoretical cause of 
the war was perhaps the least efficient, and is quite inade- 
quate to explain such vindictive and incessant and pro- 
tracted warfare. Had not other causes co-operated, blood 
never would have been shed so freely and fearfully ; and 
it would, I believe, be as reasonable to say, that the two 
parties fought because the Yorkists wore the white rose, 
and the Lancastrians the red, as to ascribe the war wholly 
to the question of genealogical right. The Yorkists were 
not warring in support of the principle of indefeasible 
succession, nor were the Lancastrians warring for the 
principle of the constitutional authority of parliamentary 
establishment. If they had been, however we might in- 
cline to one principle or the other, we might gain an 
interest in a contest, in which we could contemplate and 
admire men laying down their lives for a principle. This 
war, in which Englishmen were slaughtering Englishmen, 
was the most destructive that England had ever been en- 
gaged in ', this fraternal ferocity was the cause of the loss 
of more lives than all the wars with Wales, Scotland, and 
France ; and the difficulty is to discover the real motives 
to such a series of cruelties and carnage. Full as history 
is, from ancient years down to the present day, of wars, 
wicked from the frivolity or the insanity of the occasion 



282 LECTUKE NINTH. 



of them — ready as nations have been to plunge into hos- 
tilities — it still is incredible that the war of York and 
Lancaster was waged only on such a point of controversy 
as the real issue between the two contending parties. 
The only cause assigned is inadequate to give an interest 
to the struggle; and no other cause, that I am aware of, 
has been discovered, which would better attract the mind 
to the study of it. 

Besides the absence of intrinsic interest in the subject, 
a most vexatious obscurity envelops the whole period of 
this civil war. It is very true, as has been said, that 
" The peculiar hardship in explaining the transactions of 
those days is, that we do not know what we have to ex- 
plain, or whether we have any thing to explain at all. 
We have to solve a theorem without a proposition.^' We 
have, indeed, a considerable number of facts distinctly 
ascertained, but often utterly inexplicable; we know their 
dates, too, so that we can follow them in order of time ; 
but, as to the sequence, the connection of one with the 
other, it is utter darkness. One can make his way 
through this region of history, only as a man travels along 
an unknown road in a dark and stormy night. There 
comes a flash of light, giving a lurid and momentary con- 
ception of what is near ; and, confiding in the knowledge 
thus gained, you venture onward in the dark, till again 
you are startled by another flash, that shows how, in a 
little distance, all your expectations of what lay before 
you are illusive, and that every thing around you is 
totally difierent from what it was just now : 

" The road is black before your eyes, 
Glimmering faintly where it lies ; 



THE WAKS OF THE ROSES 283 

Black is the sky — and every hill, 
Up to the sky, is blacker still."* 

Now and then the darkness of the storm seems to be 
breaking, and light is caught from between the flying 
clouds, from the moon, or from a starlit space in the sky; 
and then, just as we are promising ourselves the calm 
vision of a tranquil hour, the tempest, that was only 
lulled, comes back again worse and darker than ever. 
So it is in the uncertain and confused history of these civil 
wars. We get the lurid and fitful light from the fields 
of twelve battles, and that is nearly all that one has to 
guide his steps by. Ever and anon, when there is some 
show of reconciliation between the factions, promising a 
little more clearness of historical knowledge, the strife is 
renewed with tenfold bitterness, and we are left in tenfold 
obscurity. If, in the fierceness of the warfare, we look 
up to heaven to discover why, in the providential govern- 
ment of the world, brother is thus furiously arrayed 
against brother for deadly carnage, we look up in vain 
for the meaning of it all, and seem to learn no more there 
than when we look to the high-reaching wickedness of 
the earthly passions of the moral combatants : 

" Black is the sky — and every hill, 
Up to the sky, is blacker still." 

Such is the obscurity enveloping much of the history of 
the War of the Roses, that one of the latest and most 
laborious of the historians of England makes the candid 
admission, that he has omitted altogether from the text 
of his history the principal events of one of the years — 

* Wordsworth. The Waggoner. 



LECTURE NINTH. 



" Because/' lie says, " in our ignorance of their causes, 
it is difficult to connect them together." He finds him- 
self unable to do more than merely mention them in a 
note.* 

But, as we shall not gain any more light by merely 
complaining of the darkness, let us make some attempt 
to set our steps forward in it. We have seen how, in the 
reign of Henry the Fifth, that sovereign enjoyed, in a 
high degree, the unanimous and afi"ectionate allegiance of 
his people ; and let us, in the first place, consider whether 
there was any thing in the character of his son, Henry 
the Sixth, that was calculated to alienate from him the 
duty and the love of his subjects. It may be truly said 
of this king that, having begun his reign in the months 
of infancy, he carried forward into the years of man- 
hood a most childlike spirit; the very innocence and sim- 
plicity of childhood seem never to have deserted him. 
One of the chroniclers has said of him — ^' King Henry- 
was a man of meek spirit and of a simple wit, pre- 
ferring peace before war, rest before business, honesty 
before profit, and quietness before labour: and to the 
intent that men might perceive that there could be 
none more chaste, more meek, more holy, nor a better 
creature, in him reigned shamefacedness, modesty, inte- 
grity, and patience to be marvelled at, taking and suffer- 
ing all losses, chances, displeasures, and such worldly 
torments, in good part and with a patient manner, as 
though they had chanced by his own fault or negligent 
oversight. He gaped not for honour, nor thirsted for 
riches ; but studied only for the health of his soul, the 

* Lingard, vol. iv. p. 104. 



THE WARS OF THE ROSES. 



saving whereof lie esteemed to be the greatest wisdom, 
and the loss thereof the extremest folly that could he." 
Another describes him — "Patience was so radicate in 
his heart that, of all the injuries to him committed, 
which was no small number, he never asked vengeance 
nor punishment, but for that rendered to Almighty God, 
his Creator, hearty thanks, thinking by this trouble and 
adversity his sins were to him forgotten and forgiven. 
This good, this gentle, this meek, this sober and wise 
man did declare and affirm, that those mischiefs and 
miseries partly came to him for his own offence, and partly 
for the heaping of sin upon sin wretchedly by his ances- 
tors and forefathers." 

The whole life of this king sustained the truth of these 
descriptions of his character ; and surely his offence to 
his turbulent countrymen was nothing more than his pure 
inoffensiveness — his unresenting meekness : 

" The universal stock of the world's injury 
"Would be too poor to find a quarrel for him."* 

Like his ancient predecessor, the sainted Saxon, King 
Edward the Confessor, the lot of Henry the Sixth was 
cast in an age of violence, and he brought nothing to 
it but a gentle spirit. Through all the tumults and the 
blood-shedding of the reign, the poor monarch wanders 
in a kind of solitary sadness of heart, the most inappro- 
priate being in the world. It was said by that ill-fated 
artist, the late Mr. Haydon, speaking of the angelic dis- 
position of a fellow-artist, that he always seemed to him 



* ** A Fair Quarrel," by Middleton and Rowley. Quoted in Henry 
Taylor's " Statesman ;" and in " Lamb's Specimens," vol. i. p. 143. 



LECTURE XIXTH. 



to have been bom in tbe "wrong planet. One cannot help 
having sometbing of tbe same feeling towards the memory 
of one so inappositely yirtuons as this good man and feeble 
king, Henry of Windsor. 

Wbile tbe cbaracter of tbe kins was negative in its in- 
fluence upon tbe nation, there were several causes wbicb, 
in tbe course of events, proved positive agencies of dis- 
affection to tbe Lancastrian dynasty. During tbe minority, 
wbile Bedford was regent in France, tbe administration 
at borne was perplexed and discordant, and tbe protector 
Gloucester bad to struggle against tbe factious ambition of 
bis rival. Cardinal Beaufort. Tbe mysterious iniquity of 
the times begins to sbow itself, wben tbe Duke of Glou- 
cester is found dead in bis bed, murdered, it was believed, 
but bow, wby, or by wbom, no one to tbis day bas dis- 
covered, so tbat tbe fact of murder bas become a question. 
In a sbort space of time, tbe aged, ricb cardinal expires; 
and Bedford is dead too, so tbat tbe great Lancastrian 
chiefs have passed away before the worst troubles of tbe 
reign begin. 

The national vanity of tbe English, which had been so 
highly stimulated by tbe victory of Agincourt and the 
short-lived conquest of French territory, was now exas- 
perated by the reverses of the war in France, and the loss 
of their continental dominions. The glory of the Plan- 
tagenets was waning, and tbe King of France was getting 
his own again ; fortress after fortress was given up by the 
English • and when the nation found themselves deprived 
of all that lately they so proudly held of French soil, save 
a mere foothold on tbe sea-shore, they turned, in the 
maddened passion of disappointed pride, to take venge- 
ance upon some one who might be made answerable for 



THE WARS OF THE KOSES. 287 



the disasters of tlie government. The national fury fell 
upon the Duke of Suffolk, as chief minister of Henry's 
government. He was impeached and tried; and the 
king, probably to save his life from the phrensy of fac- 
tion, banished him from the kingdom. On his passage 
to France, the vessel that carried him was captured by a 
ship of the royal navy; he was ordered on board, received 
with the ominous salutation — ^^ Welcome, traitor !'' a 
mock trial was held, sentence of death pronounced ; he 
was lowered into a small boat, which bore an executioner, 
a block, and a rusty sword ; his head was hacked off, and 
his corpse cast ashore upon the Dover sands. This much 
is known, and then comes the cloud over the history, and 
we are all in the dark again.* 

The murder of Suffolk seems to have been one of those 
deeds which are perpetrated by lawlessness usurping the 
place of law — the wild spirit of revenge claiming the 
power of justice. We know just enough of it to regard 
it as one of the ominous signs of perturbed times. It is 
a symptom of misgovernment and of domestic discord; 
and quickly there appears, in the shape of popular insur- 
rection, another sign of approaching anarchy. You begin 
to hear the first sounds that give signal of the coming 
convulsion that is to shake the whole fabric of the realm ; 



* It has been cleverly said " that we are certain he was put to death, 
certain he was put to death violently, and we are so thankful for these 
two known quantities, that we consider the problem easy, and the 
event almost a natural one, though the facts, as they have come down 
to us, can only be paralleled in modern description, by imagining that 
Lord Brougham, while crossing to Havre, after having been supplant- 
ed in the chancellorship, had his head chopped off on the paddle-box 
of the Grand Turk steamer, and no inquiry made about it." H. R. 



LECTURE NINTH. 



you discover tlie premonitions of the political pestilence 
that is to devastate England. Popular tumult is the first 
eruption of the disease, and just such an insurrection as 
that which was headed by Jack Cade, is the form the 
tumult is apt to take. It is licentiousness proclaiming 
freedom by the destruction of all rule and order ; it is 
ruffian ignorance taking advantage of popular discontent 
by promising absurd and impracticable reformations. Wat 
Tyler's rebellion, some seventy years before, seems to me 
to have been a much more reputable insurrection than 
Cade's. Then the populace rose, because the power of 
government was oppressive upon them, and now, because 
they felt that the authority of law was too feeble to pre- 
serve subordination. The people were estranged from the 
sovereign -, they had, in their discontent, a restless desire 
for change — they knew not what it should be ; and a low 
demagogue started them — to flatter them with promises, 
— " There shall be in England seven half-penny loaves sold 
for a penny : the three-hooped pots shall have ten hoops ; 
and I will make it felony to drink small beer : all the 
realm shall be in common, and in Cheapside shall my 
palfrey go to grass.'' Whether or no Cade's rebellion 
was fomented by the Duke of York, for the purpose of 
promoting his own aggrandizement out of the increased 
confusion, is one of the multitude of uncertainties of the 
history. York's claim to the crown is not yet made; but 
the troubles of the reign next take the form of the feud 
between York and the Lancastrian chief, the Duke of 
Somerset. It is a dispute between them, that Shakspeare 
has made the subject of the scene in the Temple garden, 
in which the origin of the adoption of the respective 
badges of the two great parties is accounted for. The 



THE WARS OF THE ROSES. 



scene, however, is a purely dramatic creation, without his- 
toric authority, as far as is known ; and I am not aware 
that history gives any explanation of the adoption of the 
white and red roses as the emblems of the Yorkists and 
Lancastrians, respectively. In that scene York, being un- 
able to obtain an oral expression of opinion respecting his 
hereditary rights, is represented saying — 

" Let him that is a true-born gentleman, 
And stands upon the honour of his birth, 
If he suppose that I have pleaded truth. 
From off this brier pluck a white rose with me ;" 

and Somerset adds — 

" Let him that is no coward, nor no flatterer, 
But dare maintain the party of the truth, 
Pluck a red rose from oflF this thorn with me." 

The angry scene closes with Warwick's prediction : 

" This brawl to-day. 
Grown to this faction, in the Temple garden. 
Shall send, between the red rose and the white, 
A thousand souls to death and deadly night." 

Before the claim of the Duke of York to the throne was 
openly asserted, the thoughts of the nation were, during 
some years, habituated to look to him as the future sove- 
reign in due course of inheritance, he being the heir pre- 
sumptive, and Henry the Sixth being then childless. The 
Duke of York became still more prominent in connection 
with royalty, by being made protector during the disability 
of the king. To the eyes of the nation, and to his own, 
the crown was visible as his future possession, until the 
birth of the Prince of Wales, the son of Henry the Sixth, 

19 



LECTURE NINTH. 



changed the prospect, and the throne could be reached 
by the family of York only by a revolutionary change. 

The battle of St. Albans, which is regarded as the be- 
ginning of the civil war, appears to have been an unpre- 
meditated conflict. The Yorkists gained the battle, and 
the king fell into their power. The fact of the battle is 
quite intelligible ; but immediately after it all that the 
triumphant Yorkists ask, is pardon : they renew their 
oaths of fealty to King Henry, and appear perfectly satis- 
fied, simply because Somerset was killed in the battle. 
Soon afterwards the gentle king reconciled the contend- 
ing parties, and a solemn procession to St PauFs Cathe- 
dral took place, in which the leaders of the two parties 
made a beautiful show of concord by walking hand in 
hand with each other. It was a very fine spectacle, but 
it was nothing more than a spectacle. The regal ambi- 
tion in the soul of York was never quenched ; and besides 
that, it was not forgotten, that in the conflict at St. Al- 
bans, Somerset, and Clifford, and Northumberland had 
fallen by the sword of their Yorkist foes ; and now there 
was burning in the bosoms of their sons and retainers a 
lust for vengeance, which years did not extinguish. More- 
over, there was the queen, the indomitable Margaret of 
Anjou, of whose character I shall speak presently. She 
was naturally suspicious of the adverse influences, which 
she saw gathering round her husband^ s throne ; and the 
Yorkists strongly reciprocated the feeling of jealousy, 
as they came to know the might of that strong-willed 
woman. 

The reconciliation endured but a little while, and then 
came another battle, the Yorkists again victorious : but 
to the great perplexity of the historical student, the vie- 



THE WARS OF THE ROSES. 



tory is scarcely completed before the fortunes of the con- 
querors are suddenly depressed^ one can hardly tell how 
or why : the Yorkist army disbands itself, and the leaders 
flee away to their strongholds. It was then that the for- 
tunes of the faction were retrieved by perhaps the most 
remarkable personage in this war — Richard Nevil, Earl of 
Warwick, ^Hhe king-maker/^ as his successful prowess 
well entitled him to be styled. Warwick returned, rallied 
the disbanded army of the Yorkists, gained the battle of 
Northampton, drove the queen into exile, and brought 
his sovereign, helpless King Henry, captive to London, — 
the victorious nobleman all the while paying the show of 
respectful homage to his prisoner-king. Professions of 
allegiance were still studiously continued. It was a civil 
war, and not yet a war of succession. But now another 
change comes over the character of the contest, for while 
the parliament was in session for the purpose of harmo- 
nizing the dissentions, the Duke of York walked into 
Westminster Hall, and moving on to the throne, he placed 
his hand upon it and stood silent in that attitude. Every 
voice was hushed. The primate of England, after a short 
pause, inquired whether he would visit the king, and the 
answer was, ^'I know of no one in this realm who ought 
not to rather visit me.'' These words, and the significant 
gesture, proclaimed for the first time, and in the presence 
of the assembled parliament, that Richard Plantagenet 
laid claim to the throne of England. The claim was soon for- 
mally submitted to parliament, and there was presented, 
for the first and the last time in English history, the ex- 
traordinary spectacle of a king reigning and a king claim- 
ing confronted, as it were, and maintaining their rights in 
the presence of the great council of the realm. When the 



292 LECTURE NINTH. 



subject was first stated to King Henry, he said, with a 
simplicity and earnestness that were impressive — "My 
father was king ; his father was also king j I have worn 
the crown forty years from my cradle; you have all sworn 
fealty to me as your sovereign, and your fathers have 
done the like to my fathers. How, then, can my right 
be disputed?'^ 

The decision of the lords in parliament was the timid 
and unsatisfactory result of compromise — that process by 
which men, in their dread of encountering either one of 
two dangers, bring both upon themselves. Henry's pos- 
session of the crown was confirmed ; but, on his death, to 
the exclusion of his son, the Duke of York and his heirs 
were to succeed. This wretched bargain was the occa- 
sion of another solemn procession of amity to St. Paul's. 

It is at this crisis of the war that we may best turn to 
the character of Queen Margaret; for upon her was the 
cause of the Lancastrian succession now dependent. 
From Shakspeare and the chroniclers we receive a very 
harsh impression of the character of Margaret of Anjou, 
for they present her in repulsive, if not hideous, colours. 
She is portrayed unfeminine, arbitrary, revengeful, licen- 
tious, and even her energy and fortitude are distorted 
into unnatural ferocity and obduracy. I greatly distrust 
this representation, not because I am able to find histori- 
cal authority for a different and better character, but be- 
cause there was so^ much that would almost irresistibly 
render the English judgment on her memory prejudiced 
and unjust. The marriage-contract between her and 
Henry the Sixth stipulated for the cession of territory to 
her father, Rene of Anjou, that amiable, but, perhaps, 
ijomewhat fantastic person, who was happy in the pompous 



THE WARS OF THE ROSES. 



possession of three regal titles, without a rood of land in 
either of his kingdoms, Naples, Sicily, and Jerusalem; 
and who spent his days in a sort of pleasant dream of the 
innocent play of chivalry, and the songs of troubadours. 
Margaret came to England a Frenchwoman, to be the 
Queen of England, just at the time when English pride 
was exasperated by French victories ; and, moreover, she 
was soon placed in the unnatural attitude of supplying by 
her character the feebleness of her husband's rule. The 
almost feminine gentleness of Henry's disposition gives 
an offensively masculine character to Margaret's life. 
She could not but see that the throne was environed with 
dangers, the perils of false friends and open enemies. 
She could not but see the helplessness of her royal hus- 
band ; and she ought not to be judged too severely, when 
we consider that if her natural temper led to it, so also 
did the necessity of the case constrain her to do one of 
the worst things a woman can do, make a man of herself. 
And this was done, not as by her illustrious country- 
woman, the Maid of Orleans, under religious influences, 
but for purposes of worldly policy. Still, these purposes 
were the defence of her king and husband, the possession 
of the throne, and the maintenance of the hereditary 
rights of her son. She may have been all that the Eng- 
lish chroniclers and the English dramatist represent; but 
I do distrust it, because she was in the very position 
— the relation to a divided and misgoverned people — that 
would inevitably cause a great deal to be attributed to her, 
for which she may not have been rightfully responsible. 
Considering all the circumstances — more than I can stop 
to treat of — ^how natural, and yet how unjust, would it be 
for the adverse party to trace every obnoxious measure of 



294 LECTURE NINTH. 



the government^ and many an atrocity in the war, to the 
Frenchwoman on the throne — the strong and determined 
wife of an irresolute and unregarded king. 

I dare say that, in her way of life, there may have been 
much that is revolting to our sense of female character; 
indeed, it could not be otherwise; for a woman can hardly 
play a man's part in the work of the world without griev- 
ous detriment to her own nature. But one is still enti- 
tled to contemplate Queen Margaret, not as a vulgar and 
hideous Amazon, but as a woman under the dire neces- 
sity of mingling in scenes of war. After the parliament- 
ary compromise, in which the succession of her son was 
sacrificed, we can behold her as an heroic matron warring 
for the rights of her child when the father's feeble hand 
could not defend them. She gathers an army, which the 
Duke of York, contemptuously encountering, pays a bloody 
penalty for the folly of rashly despising an enemy. He 
was slain at the battle of Wakefield ; and, in as short a 
time as two months after he had walked in procession to 
St. Paul's, as the newly-declared heir-apparent, his gory 
head, insulted with a paper crown, was set upon the gates 
of York. After such a catastrophe, the reader of history 
naturally looks for the establishment of Lancastrian su- 
premacy ; but no — the rights of the Duke of York, and 
the feudal inheritance of vengeance for his death, pass to 
his son, the Earl of March, a youth of nineteen years of 
age; and from this time, the war becomes more ferocious 
than ever, and with a deeper thirst for revenge. The 
warlike queen pursues her success by the rescue of her 
husband from his captivity, but the young Duke of York 
enters London, and is proclaimed King Edward the 
Fourth. 



THE WARS OF THE ROSES. 



The coronation of the new monarch was postponed 
until further hostilities should give him stronger posses- 
sion of the throne. There were now two kings in the 
land, Henry the Sixth and Edward the Fourth ; and the 
battle that soon followed between the two royal armies, 
shows, more impressively, perhaps, than any other in the 
war, to what fearful issues of carnage and bloodshed the 
passions of faction and civil war can drive men of the 
same kindred and the same homes. No foreigner shared 
in the strife ; there were none but Englishmen present, 
and of them more than one hundred thousand were drawn 
up, in no very unequal division, in hostile array on the 
field of Towton. Both sovereigns were present. King 
Edward and King Henry, or, perhaps we had better say. 
Queen Margaret. Proclamation had been made that no 
quarter should be given ; and faithfully and fiercely was 
the order obeyed, so that it proved probably the bloodiest 
battle in British history. The desperate conflict lasted 
more than a day ; and some idea may be formed of the 
slaughter, when it is said the number of the Englishmen 
slain exceeded the sum of those who fell at Vimiero, 
Talavera, Albuera, Salamanca, Vittoria — five great battles 
of the Peninsular War — and at Waterloo combined.* 
This enormous shedding of English blood was by English 



* I do not know the authority for this exact statement. In 
Southey's Colloquies, vol. i. p. 210, Montesinos says : — ** More English- 
men fell at Towton than in any of Marlborough's battles or at 
Waterloo." Lingard says that Edward the Fourth, in a confidential 
letter to his mother, while he conceals his own loss, tells her that his 
heralds counted twenty-eight thousand Lancastrian dead on the field, 
"It was," says the historian, "a decisive victory, but it cost the 
nation a deluge of blood." W. B. R. 



LECTURE NINTH. 



hands. The battle ended in the total rout of the Lancas- 
trians^ and the crown was finnly placed on the brow of 
Edward the Fourth. 

So decided a yictory, one would imagine, must have 
closed the contest; but no; for ten perilous years was 
the stmggle continued, chiefly by the indomitable energy 
of Queen Margaret. Poor King Henry took refuge in 
the secluded regions of the Xorth of England, but was 
betrayed and committed prisoner in the Tower of London, 
while his queen, eluding her enemies, is with difficulty 
followed in her rapid and unwearied movements, at one 
time rallying her English partisans and risking battle, 
again seeking alliance and help from the King of France. 
Perils by land and perils by sea making up the wild story 
of her adventures, we hear of her at one time shipwrecked, 
and, at another, falling into the hands of a band of roving 
banditti. She struggled to the last — as long as she had 
a husband or a child whose rights were to be contended 
for. 

The later years of the war are no less perplexed than 
the beginning; and I do not know that, in the events 
that follow, there is to be discovered any thing especially 
characteristic of the age or expressive of the spirit of the 
times, except the conduct of that great feudal lord, the 
Earl of "VTarwick. It was chiefly by him that Edward 
the Fourth had been helped to the throne; and, when 
the king-maker found cause of quarrel with the monarch, 
he turned his allegiance away, and the greatest of the 
Yorkist chieftains was afterwards an adherent of the Lan- 
castrians. King Edward became the prisoner of the 
proud nobleman, and one of the extraordinary spectacles 
which England exhibited in this war, was tlvat of two 



THE WARS OF THE KOSES. 



rival kings, each, confined in prison and at the same time. 
The king-maker was strong enough to lift up the pros- 
trate Lancaster. Edward the Fourth fled from the palace 
and the kingdom ; and his imprisoned rival was led forth 
from the Tower to hear the streets of London resounding 
once more with the name of King Henry. This sur- 
prising restoration gave, however, but a brief respite to 
the Lancastrian family before its final overthrow. The 
fugitive Edward returned to recover the crown, and, as it 
proved, to extinguish the opposing dynasty. He landed 
at Ravenspurg — the very place, as has been observed, 
where Bolingbroke, the Lancastrian progenitor, landed, 
when he came to deprive Richard the Second of the 
crown and to usurp it for himself; so fatal was that spot 
for the Plantagenets, first of the one and then of the other 
line. The landing of Edward at Ravenspurg has been 
compared to the return of Napoleon from Elba, when he 
came to shake the Bourbons again from the throne so 
lately restored to them. The comparison holds good as 
to the boldness and rapidity of the exploits; for, in 
about forty days, the counter-revolution of Edward was 
completed. 

In regard to the first reception and the final results, 
the parallel fails. When Edward landed, he found that 
none durst speak in his favour for dread of Warwick; 
and he could advance into the country only, as Boling- 
broke had done, under the crafty plea that he came to 
claim no more than his duchy. The disguise was, ere 
long, thrown ofi" : he fought and gained a battle in which 
his chief adversai-y, the king-maker Warwick, was left 
dead on the field. He entered London in triumph, was 
king again, and poor King Henry, of whom we never 



LECTURE NINTH. 



hear any thing, except when something is done to him, 
was remanded to the Tower, never again to leave it alive. 
The last convulsive effort of Queen Margaret was made 
at Tewkesbury, where the Lancastrian party met with its 
final defeat. The misery of the hapless queen was com- 
pleted by the barbarous murder of her only child, the 
young Prince of Wales, who was stabbed to death, it is 
supposed, by King Edward's brothers, Clarence and 
Gloster — the horrid deed which Shakspeare has fitly 
made one of the phantoms that haunted the death-dream 
of Clarence : 

" Then came wandering by, 
A shadow like an angel, with bright hair 
Dabbled in blood ; — and he shiyiek'd out aloud, 
' Clarence is come — false, fleeting, perjur'd Clarence, 
That stabb'd me in the field by Tewkesbury; — 
Seize on him furies, — take him to your torments.'" 

The murder of the old king, the harmless Henry, soon 
followed, the bloody release to his grieved spirit being 
given by the dagger of the Duke of Grioster — ^if popular 
belief has rightly rested on that, one of the dark deeds 
which belong to the history of the tower of London. 
The Lancastrian king and the Lancastrian heir having 
been destroyed, their great champion, the queen, Mar- 
garet of Anjou, is left alone ; and, so far as the story of 
her life is connected with the annals of England, the last 
image which we have of her is, as she stands in the 
tragic sublimity of wo, discrowned, widowed, childless, 
captive, and desolate.* 



* After five years of captivity in England, she was ransomed by the 
King of France and returned to her native country; where, in about 



THE WARS OF THE ROSES. 



For sixteen years had the War of the Roses lasted, 
and eleven fierce and bloody battles had been fought by 
English with English alone within the narrow limits of 
England. Children had grown up with no other spec- 
tacle of their native land than as a battle-ground on which 
their countrymen were shedding one another's blood; 
and now that the war was at an end — at least so far as 
the undisturbed occupation of the throne of England was 
affected by it — the question naturally presents itself — 
What meaning had this war ? Can it be possible that all 

five years more, her eventful and unhappy life came to its end. The 
latter part of her life is a subject that has fallen into the hands of 
Shakspeare's great successor in imaginative historical literature. In 
the romance of ''Anne of Geierstein" Sir Walter Scott has introduced 
the character of Queen Margaret during the last years of her life, and 
he has represented her with a finer justice than is awarded to her in 
the dramas. It is with admirable impartiality, and with the highest 
art, that Scott has dealt with the majestic ruin of Margaret's mighty 
and ambitious spii-it, when, as he describes her, during the interview 
with the young Lancastrian in the Cathedral of Strasburg — " Though 
rivers of tears had farrowed the cheek — though care, disappointment, 
domestic grief, and humbled pride had quenched the fire of her eye 
and wasted the smooth dignity of her forehead — her noble and majes- 
tic features even yet showed the remains of that beauty which once 
was held unequalled in Europe." 

Scott has traced the course of Margaret's aspiring and restless spirit 
on to her death, and even to the last sound of the solemn dirge over 
her grave. It is over the close of her story that Scott cites the lines 
entitled from an " Old Poem," but, doubtless, his own : 

" Toll, toll the bell- 
Greatness is o'er; 
The heart has broke, 
To ache no more. 

An unsubstantial pageant all — 

Drop o'er the scene the funeral pall." H. R. 



LECTURE NINTH. 



this ferocity and havoc was significant of nothing more 
than the contest for the throne? Can it be that the 
mere question, which of two cousins should fill the throne 
— whether Henry Plantagenet or Edward Plantagenet 
should wear the crown — drove the multitudes of men to 
such fierce extremities of civil strife ? Was all the 
misery and bloodshed of this war expended for no other 
consequence than a dubious settlement of succession? 
We should, indeed, study history very superficially if we 
thought so. 

In the progress of constitutional freedom there was a 
great and permanent consequence of this civil war, which 
outweighs a thousand-fold the importance of any right 
of York or Lancaster. It was a result which the com- 
batants on neither side contended for, and, indeed, they 
could not have dreamed of it. It was this : the devasta- 
tion of the war wrought the downfall of English feudal- 
ism, and thus efi*ected a great revolution in the aristo- 
cratic element of the Constitution. The war was the 
unconscious death-struggle of the martial power of the 
nobility. It would seem as if feudalism was to display 
its greatest splendour immediately before it was extin- 
guished — as if it were to rise to its highest prowess 
immediately before it fell into irretrievable exhaustion. 
As the sun of feudal power in England went down, it 
blazed forth with the light of a larger and redder orb 
through the clouds of war that gathered around its 
setting. 

During the whole extent of England's history, under 
the Saxon, Dane, or Norman, the mightiest of her barons 
was the king-maker Warwick. It was his power that 
made Edward king, and his that unmade him. It was 



THE WARS OF THE ROSES. 



his power that dethroned King Henry, and it was his 
that restored him. Each monarch in turn became the 
captive and prisoner of this great earl. With princely 
revenues and estates, Warwick's vassals were an army; 
and some notion may be formed of the force he could, at 
will, bring armed into the field, from the fact that he is 
said to have daily feasted, at his numerous manors and 
castles, upward of thirty thousand persons. The other 
nobles possessed, in their degree, the power of an armed 
feudal retinue, ready to follow their lord to battle in any 
cause of his choosing; and thus there was a baronial 
power of which modern England shows only the shadow. 
As the traveller now beholds the stately walls of War- 
wick Castle, or wanders amid the ruins of Kenilworth — 

" Where battlement and moated gate 
Are objects only for the hand 
Of hoary Time to decorate," — * 

he can scarce, with all the impulse given to his imagina- 
tion, call up the vision of the armed hosts which, some 
three hundred years ago, could, at a moment's summons, 
be gathered there in battle array. 

The war of York and Lancaster was a self-exhausting 
contest of the nobles. At the battle of Northampton the 
order was given through the field to strike at the lords, 
knights, and esquires, rather than at the common people. 
In the course of the war eighty princes of the blood were 
killed, and the ancient nobility nearly annihilated. 

Every individual of two generations of the families of 
Somerset and Warwick fell on the field or on the scaffold- 

* Wordsworth's Lines to a Lady. Works, p. 411. 



LECTURE NINTH. 



Many of those wlio escaped the carnage were impoverished 
and outcast from their homes. "I myself saw/^ says 
Philip de Commines^ '^ the Duke of Exeter, the King of 
England's brother-in-law, walking barefoot after the Duke 
of Burgundy's train, and earning his bread by begging 
from door to door."* The martial fierceness of a feudal 
nobility was tamed ; and, with the decline of the force 
which feudalism armed them with, the way was prepared 
for converting them into the pacific aristocracy of more 
modern times. This change was wrought upon the gene- 
ration of nobles during the civil war by the varied influ- 
ences and lessons of adversity. Feudal pride had its fall, 
and feudal vengeance was softened to a gentler feeling. 
In this change there was a silent and momentous revolu- 
tion J and it may, perhaps, be illustrated to you by the 
romantic story connected with the change as exemplified 
in the family of the Cliffords. At the first battle in the 
war. Lord Clifford was slain by the Duke of York ; and 
the filial vengeance which fired the breast of the next 
Lord Clifford was scarce appeased, when, in the same 
battle in which York was slain, his son, young Rutland, 
was stabbed by Clifford, whose unpitying warfare earned 
for him the titles of 'Hhe butcher'^ and the ^^ black Clif- 
ford." His death on the bloody field of Towton gave the 
Yorkists their retaliation, and the title of Clifford passed 
to his son, a young child, whose mother fled with him to 
find safety amid secluded lakes and mountains in the 
North. To elude the unrelenting pursuit and search of 
his enemies, the boy was trained in the simplicity and 
severity of a shepherd's life, with no more than dim 

"■•^ Memoixes de Commines, Liv. iii. ch. iv. 



THE WARS OF THE ROSES. 



remembrances of his father's bloody death, and of the 
perils he must have witnessed in his early childhood, or 
seen reflected from his mother's brow. In shepherd's 
garb he learned to love the simple folk and the mute 
creation with whom his days were spent ; he carried, too, 
into all his after life, peacefully protracted, as it was, to a 
good old age, a passion for the tranquil pursuits of science ; 
for, while tending his flocks, he gazed from the lonely 
mountain-top upon the stars, and the beauty and peace 
of their placid motion sank deep into the soul of the fierce 
warrior's child. His fathers, through many a generation, 
had been surrounded by all the pomp of chivalry and by 
their troops of vassals ; but, for this boy — 

" To his side the fallow-deer 
Came and rested without fear; 
The eagle, lord of land and sea, 
Stoop'd down to do him fealty."* 

It was not until after more than twenty years — not until 
after the dynasty of the house of York had passed away — 
that the young Clifford was restored to his estates, to 
which he came, doubtless, a wiser and a better man than 
any of his stern progenitors ; for, as a poet has commemo- 
rated the story of his life, which history has hardly 
heeded, this Clifford was one — 

" Who long compelled in humble walks to go, 

Was softened into feeling, soothed, and tamed. 

Love had he found in huts where poor men lie, 
His daily teachers had been woods and rills, 

* Wordsworth's Song at the Feast of Brougham Castle. Works, 
p. 187. 



LECTURE NINTH. 



The silence that is in the starry sky, 
The sleep that is among the lonely hills. 

In him the savage virtue of the race, 

Revenge, and all ferocious thoughts were dead : 

Nor did he change ; but kept in lofty place 
The wisdom which adversity had bred. 

Glad were the vales, and every cottage hearth ; 

The shepherd lord was honoured more and more ; 
And ages after he was laid in earth, 

' The good Lord Clifford' was the name he bore."* 

One of the most remarkable facts connected with this 
period of history is, that, when the Wars of the Roses 
were over, after all the aggravated and unsparing hostili- 
ties, little animosity appears to have remained among the 
surviTors and their descendants. The solution of this 
fact is this, I believe : — that, having taken the field simply 
as retainers of nobles opposed to each other, they ceased 
to cherish belligerent feelings, when the relation to their 
superior lord ended. The vassal of Clifford, for example, 
and the vassal of Salisbury fought fiercely with each 
other; but, when they ceased to be the fighting vas- 
sals, they looked upon each other as fellow-countrymen, 
and so their hatred was spent. 

After dwelling upon the evils of these distressful times, 
I wish not to overlook the good that was silently work- 
ing out from them. "^Yhile the two aristocratic factions 
of the realm were sweeping along with the tide of war a 
large portion of the people, composed of the multitude 
of their retainers, there was still a mass of the popula- 



* "Wordsworth's Song at the Feast of Brougham Castle. "Works, 
p. 188. 



THE WARS OF THE ROSES. 305 



tion that kept aloof from the strife, who neither shared 
in it nor suffered by it. There was happily no ecclesias- 
tical element in the war; the church was not known in 
it — it was neither Yorkist nor Lancastrian; and no 
bishop or abbot appeared in it, except to stay, if possible, 
the shedding of blood, or to give sanctuary to the help- 
less or comfort to the suffering. While the feudal power 
of the nobles was sinking, the common people were rising. 
It has been well observed by Southey, that — '^ Inasmuch 
as both parties exerted themselves to bring into the field 
all the force they could muster, the villeins in great num- 
bers were then emancipated when they were embodied in 
arms; and great numbers emancipated themselves, flying 
to London and other cities for protection from the imme- 
diate evils of war; or, taking advantage of the frequent 
changes of property, and the precarious tenure by which 
it was held, to exchange their own servile condition for a 
station of freedom with all its hopes and chances.^' 

It is to be observed, too, that, ferocious and sanguinary 
as the civil war was, its fury spared the cities and towns. 
There was no burning or sacking of towns; there was 
no pillaging or devastation of churches or monasteries, so 
that a peaceful current of good was still flowing under- 
neath the war. It is a noticeable fact that, during the 
perturbed reign of Henry the Sixth, as if at once to meet — 
what could not then have been foreseen — the wants of the 
people as they rose from feudal servitude, schools in lion- 
don and throughout the realm were extensively endowed.* 



* The spread of education was one of the innovations, it wiU be re- 
membered, that excited the ire of Jack Cade when his ruffians brought 
Lord Say a prisoner to him, and Cade tells him — 

20 



306 LECTURE NINTH. 



Having spoken, somewliat contemptuously, perhaps, of 
the utter insignificance of Henry tlie Sixth, in the war- 
like doings of his reign, I must add, in justice, that his 
memory is finely redeemed, for national gratitude is due 
to him for that college at Cambridge, the gorgeous 
Grothic architecture of which has made the name of 
King's College famous over the world. He was also the 
founder of Eton College — that great school which stands 
by the side of the ancient palace of England's kings, and 
with the red-cross flag on Windsor Castle waving in 
sight of it. Instead of leaving your mind with a con- 
tempt for the good King Henry the Sixth — instead of 
dismissing the subject with the last thought of his gen- 
tle unfitness for a warlike reign, I am glad to turn to 
a vindication of his memory — a plea for gratitude that, 
not long since, was wisely and appropriately uttered in 
Eton College : 

"If we were required to point out the most disastrous 
period of English history, we should, perhaps, fix upon 
the reign of Henry the Sixth. In his earlier years he 
saw the foreign possessions acquired by his father's victo- 
ries, successively wrested from his hands; and, towards 
its close, he saw his kingdom wasted by the fury of civil 
war, and the blood of his subjects profusely shed in the 



" Thou hast most traitorously corrupted the youth of the realm, in 
erecting a grammar school; and, whereas, before, our forefathers 
had no other books but the score and the tally, thou hast caused 
printing to be used; and, contrary to the king, his crown, and 
dignity, thou hast built a paper-mill. It will be proved to thj' face 
that thou hast men about thee that usually talk of a noun, and a 
verb, and such abominable words as no Christian can endure to 
hear." H. R. 



THE WARS OF THE ROSES. 307 



unnatural contest. He himself, meanwhile, appeared in 
no degree to influence the progress of events, whicli were 
to terminate in the loss of his sceptre and his life. 
Transferred from a throne to a prison, and again from 
a prison to a throne, he seemed to be the sport of 
fortune; a merely passive instrument in the hands of 
others; a spectator, rather than an actor, in the event- 
ful drama. His thoughts and affections were fixed 
upon very different objects from those for which worldly 
ambition contends. Bent on securing for himself an 
imperishable crown, he felt little solicitude about the 
perishable crown which was to be the prize of the vic- 
tor in the bloody strife. The world, therefore, while it 
has bestowed on him some portion of its pity, as on 
one who underwent much unmerited suffering, has pro- 
nounced him unfit for the station which he filled, and 
utterly useless in his generation. Yet it has pleased 
the Almighty to ordain that this despised, this suffer- 
ing monarch, should exercise a more powerful and more 
permanent influence over future ages than many princes 
whose exploits are the theme of the world's applause. 
What traces can we now discern of the effects of his 
father's victories ? They form a page, a brilliant page, 
in history, on which we dwell with exultation, and 
which has inspired many a bosom with the desire of 
military glory. But, as to any present influence on 
the interests of the country, they are as if they had 
never been; whereas, the foundation of Eton College 
exercises an influence which is now felt, and will con- 
tinue to be felt to the remotest times. To the intel- 
lectual and moral training, to which the youthful mind 



LECTURE NINTH. 



is here subjected, perhaps is owing more than to any 
other single cause, the formation of that national cha- 
racter, which has, under the Divine blessing, raised Eng- 
land to its eminent position among the people of the 
earth/^* 



* This is an extract from an address delivered after a confirmation, 
at Eton College, in 1844, by Dr. Kaye, Bishop of Lincoln, and quoted 
in a little work that I found in my brother's library, entitled "The 
Unity of History, or Outlines of Lectures on Ancient and Modern His- 
tory considered on the principles of the Church of England/* by the 
Rev. C. J. Abraham, London, 1845. W. B. R. 



LECTURE X* 



The character of Edward the Fourth — His death — Richard's usurpa- 
tion — Its character of intrigue and violence — The princes in the 
Tower — Attempted vindications — Their inefficacy — Sir Thomas More 
— Richard's deformity, mental and physical — Effect of personal de- 
formity — Commanding intellect of the king — Power of will — No 
sympathy — No repentance— Contrast of Macbeth— Richard's dream — ■ 
The last of the Plantagenets — The Tudor kings — Henry the Eighth 
— The progress of society and government — Henry's reign nearly 
contemporary with Shakspeare — The play of Henry the Eighth his- 
tory — Wolsey's character — Catharine of Arragon — "VVolsey's fall and 
death — The approaching Reformation — Henry's character the worst 
in history — His death — Conclusion. 

After the close of the War of the Roses, and the 
death of that good man, King Henry the Sixth, the 
throne of England was peacefully held by Edward the 
Fourth, who kept until his death the possession, which 
had cost so much peril to himself and havoc in the realm. 
The battle of Tewkesbury was followed in Edward's reign 
by twelve years of peace and of exhaustion ; and, at the 
end of that time, during which there were scarce any 
events of importance or interest, the monarch died a 
death, which had become most unusual in the York 



* March 1st, 1847. 

309 



LECTURE TENTH. 



family — he died in his bed ; for it may be mentioned as 
one of the indications of the sanguinary character of the 
timeS; that the lives of his father and grandfather and 
his three brothers, ended bloodily or violently. The cha- 
racter of Edward the Fourth was briefly this : he was a 
warlike and a voluptuous prince, equally ready for the 
perils of war and the pleasures of peace. The military 
hardships of his early life seem to have been regarded by 
him as warrant for the uncurbed licentiousness of his un- 
disturbed royalty. One of the elder English historians, 
in summing up his character, says that — ^^ He lived too 
fast; and that, while no man acted with more vigour 
and spirit in all the distressed and dangerous situations 
of his afiairs, yet, when the danger or difficulties were 
over, he relapsed constantly into a sauntering way with 
the fair sex.^' What precisely the historian meant by a 
sauntering way with the fair sex, I need not stop to de- 
scribe further than to say that, while Edward displayed 
in his belligerent days an energy and dauntless intrepidity 
like that of as stern and indefatigable a warrior as Crom- 
well, in his peaceful years he sank into the easy morality 
of as gay a voluptuary as Charles the Second. It is one 
of the dark truths of human nature, that men can mingle 
with all the levity of loose pleasures the perpetration of 
deeds of appalling ferocity ; for the heart becomes so in- 
durated by continued self-iudulgence, that the conscience 
will be troubled no more by crimes of cruelty and blood- 
shed than by its frolic immoralities. The close of the 
career of this voluptuous prince. King Edward the 
Pourth, was darkened by the guilt of fratricide. The 
share he had in the murderous killing of his brother, 
Clarence, is finely represented by Shakspeare as embitter- 



THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE THIRD. 311 



ing his last hours. Immediately on being informed of 
the death of Clarence, he is solicited by Lord Stanley to 
pardon one of his servants, and his perturbed conscience 
finds voice in the answer to the suit : 

" Have I a tongue to doom my brother's death, 
And shall that tongue give pardon to a slave ? 
My brother killed no man, his fault was thought. 
And yet his punishraent was bitter death. 
"Who sued to me for him ? Who in my wrath 
Kneel'd at my feet, and bade me be advised ? 
Who spoke of brotherhood ? Who spoke of love ? 
Who told me how the poor soul did forsake 
The mighty Warwick and did fight for me ? 
Who told me in the field at Tewksbury 
When Oxford had me down, he rescued me. 
And said, — Dear brother, live, and be a king? 
Who told me, when we both lay in the field. 
Frozen almost to death, how he did lap me 
Even in his garments, and did give himself, 
All thin and naked, to the numb-cold night? 
All this from my remembrance brutish wrath 
Sinfully pluck' d, and not a man of you 
Had so much grace to put it in my mind." 

Edward's undisturbed occupation of the throne gave 
deceitful promise of the security of the house of York, 
and of the return of tranquil times. Even during the 
peaceful part of his reign, the elements of discord were 
secretly fermenting, and the evil eye of the strongest man 
of the Yorkist race was watching the chances for usurpa- 
tion. The death hours of Edward the Fourth may well 
have been embittered, not only by the memory of many 
an act of ruthless violence, but by gloomy forebodings for 
his young heir, to the unformed strength of whose hands 
the sceptre was to pass. Edward the Fifth succeeded to 



312 LECTURE TENTH. 



his father's throne when but thirteen years old, and he 
reigned for less than thirteen weeks. His name stands 
on the list of English sovereigns, and his statue may fill 
a niche with the images of the rest; hut there is only 
the name and shadow of a reign. Under the dark pro- 
tectorship of his uncle, the Duke of Gloucester, the 
youthful sovereign went speedily from the palace to a 
prison, and found secret death and burial within the gloomy 
precincts of the Tower of London. Whatever there was 
of justice in the original claim of the York family to the 
throne, it was established with so much wrong and 
iniquity that it had no sure foundation to rest on ; and 
after Edward the Fourth's triumphant career, retribution 
fell heavily on his sons and successors. Indeed, when 
we consider the mingled right and wrong in both the 
Lancastrian and York titles, it would seem as if the good 
in each was rewarded with a brief season of success, after 
which the meed of misery was awarded to the guilt. 
The ruin of the house of York was not only the retribu- 
tive consequence of its crimes, but it was to be effected 
by the atrocities of him who was to be the last of the 
dynasty. 

It is not necessary that I should follow with any com- 
ment the usurpation of Richard the Third. It is a fami- 
liar story of craft and cruelty directed to the accomplish- 
ment of a purpose, which, probably, had long been present 
to his thoughts. It is one of the miseries of civil war 
that it destroys all sense of security of life or of possession 
of any kind; and it is then, when the whole fabric of 
society is unstable, that the worst passions display them- 
selves and roam abroad in all their force. AVitnessing, 
during the early part of his career, the confusion and 



THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE THIRD. 313 



anarcty of the War of the Roses, Richard may well have 
seen that, if the chances of an unsettled time did not 
better his prospect of inheriting the crown, still the mind 
of the people had become familiar with sudden and revo- 
lutionary changes and scenes of bloodshed. The times 
and the bold and unscrupulous usurper were fitted for one 
another ; and the accession of such a man as Richard, and 
such a reign as his, seem no more than the natural sequel 
to the civil war. 

"V\Tien we consider the process of the usurpation, and 
some of the means employed to accomplish it, we seem to 
be passing from the days of open feudal violence to the 
times of modern intrigue. If, in the previous period the 
nobles were seen armed in the field, and openly warring 
for one or the other claimant, we now find the Duke of 
Buckingham in the meaner attitude of the demagogue. 
He is seen, not like "the king-maker'^ Warwick, making 
a path to the throne with his sword, but giving his tongue 
to falsehood and deceit, — playing a deep game of hypo- 
crisy and fraud. The speech of Buckingham to the people, 
when he endeavours to insinuate Richard's title to the 
crown into their minds, is for all the world like the craft 
of a modern politician, stimulating a factitious public 
opinion for selfish purposes : 

" When my oratory grew to an end 
I bade them, that did love their country's good 
Cry — God save Richard, England's royal king ! 
Glos. And did they so ? 

Buck. No, so God help me ! they spake not a word, 
But like dumb statues or breathless stones, 
Stared on each other, and look'd deadly pale : 
Which when I saw, I reprehended them, 
And ask'd the Mayor, what meant this wilful silence. 



314 LECTURE TENTH. 



His answer was — the people were not used 

To be spoke to but by the recorder. 

Then he was urged to te]l my tale again ; — 

* Thus saith the duke/ ' thus hath the duke inferred/ 
But nothing spoke in warrant from himself. 

When he had done, some followers of my own. 

At lower end o' the hall, hurled up their caps. 

And some ten voices cried — * God save King Eichard !* 

And thus I took the vantage of those few. 

' Thanks, gentle citizens and friends/ quoth I, 

* This general applause and cheerful shout 
Argues your wisdom and your love to Richard / 
And even here brake off and came away." 

Again, in tHs previous period, the deaths of violence, 
even when not in battle, were open deeds of atrocity and 
bloodshed, as that which caused 

** The piteous moan that Rutland made, 
When black-faced Clifford shook his sword at him," 

or when Prince Edward was stabbed in the field at 
Tewksbury; but now there is a transaction secret and 
mysterious — dark assassination — the dread doings in the 
Tower of London, such as the killing of Clarence, or the 
more piteous murder of the princes, when Tyrrel was in- 
trusted with the keys of the Tower for only twenty-four 
hours; the murder, which he feared to look on, but is 
represented as describing : 

" The tyrannous and bloody act is done, 
The most arch-deed of piteous massacre 
That ever yet this land was guilty of. 
Dighton and Forrest, whom I did suborn 
To do this piece of ruthless butchery, 
Albeit they were fiesh'd villains, bloody dogs, 



THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE THIRD. 316 



Melting with tenderness and mild compassion, 

"Wept like two children, in their death's-sad story, 

' 0, thus,' quoth Dighton, 'lay the gentle babes' — 

* Thus, thus,' quoth Forrest, * girdling one another 

"Within their alabaster innocent arms. 

Their lips were four red roses on a stalk. 

Which in their summer-beauty kiss'd each other. 

A book of prayers on their pillow lay. 

Which once,' quoth Forrest, 'almost changed my mind; 

But 0, the devil' — there the villain stopped; 

When Dighton thus told on — *We smothered 

The most replenished sweet work of Nature, 

That from the prime creation e'er she framed.' " 

There is no event connected witli the history of Richard 
the Third, which has added more to the accumulated 
odium that rests upon the tyrant's memory, than the 
mysterious death of his young kinsmen, the two princely 
Plantagenets, who are believed to have been cruelly as- 
sassinated in the Tower. Out of the mystery which shrouds 
the story, there have been spun speculations, intended to 
discredit the tradition, which traced the horrid guilt to 
the stern usurper ; but the popular belief has been too 
widely spread to be shaken, and it is thought to stand 
upon the basis of truth. An impressive confirmation was 
given to it, when, nearly two hundred years after the time 
the murder was secretly perpetrated, some excavations in 
the Tower of London, during the reign of Charles the 
Second, brought to light the bones of two striplings, -con- 
tained in a chest, buried where no intentional search was 
likely to discover it ; and when its ghastly and moulder- 
ing contents were disclosed, the voice of the murdered 
children spake, as it were from their secret grave, to chase 
away the mystery that hung over the story of their death 
So little doubt was entertained as to the identity of the 



316 LECTURE TENTH. 



mortal remains thus discovered, that the bones were re- 
moved and received royal sepulture.* 

It is not only from the reproach of having caused the 
murder of the princes, that attempts have been made to 
relieve the memoiy of Richard the Third. The bolder 
effort of a still more general vindication has, from time 
to time, been made ; and not only the innocence of his 
life been asserted, but also the goodness of his disposition 
and the comeliness of his personal appearance. It has been 
contended, that the popular notion of Richard's character 
is a party delusion, by which his mind, his morals, and his 
make, have all been misrepresented, — that it is all a matter 
of Lancastrian prejudice, which Shakspeare has injuri- 
ously fomented, and that, as to his personal appearance, 
the crooked back, and the shrivelled arm, and the de- 
formity of face, were all exaggerations and distortions of 
nothing more than low stature and a stern visage. The 
most noted of Richard's apologists and advocates was 
Horace Walpole, who startled the reading world by his 
historic doubts on this subject. The paradox was not ori- 
ginal, for it had been the burden of an old book many 
years before Walpole's time ; and lately an Englishwoman, 
whose name I do not now recall, has written a book to 
prove that Richard was ^Hruly a marvellous proper man," 
who has been used very badly by posterity. f 

Such historic doubts are entitled to consideration, for 
certainly it is not unfrequently found, that gross tradi- 
tional errors have gained a place in history, and it is 



* The disinterment of these supposed royal remains was in 1674. 
See Appendix to chap. vii. vol. iii. Lingard. 

t This I presume to be Richard the Third as Duke of Gloucester 
and King of England, by Caroline A. Halstead. London, 1844. W. B. R. 



THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE THIRD. 317 



never too late to vindicate and assert tlie trutli ; to rescue 
it, when beleagured by triumphant falsehood, is the worthy 
duty of a strong and intrepid intellect. In the present 
case, the attempt to turn the current of historical opinion 
has proved vain, and all the ingenuity of argument and 
parade of testimony have failed in redeeming the memory 
of Kichard from the detestation with which it so long has 
been regarded. Under its load of obloquy the most accu- 
rate and judicious historians are still content to leave it. 

In the dramatic delineation of the character of Richard, 
Shakspeare followed the description and the narrative 
given by Sir Thomas More and the chroniclers, and has 
produced his own conception of the character in corre- 
spondence with the popular notion. Shakspeare followed 
faithfully the best historical authorities of his day, in 
whom, as well as in the poetic portraiture, there may have 
been some exaggeration — a deeper shade may have been 
given to the blackness of guilt ; but still we are safe in be- 
lieving, that the truth was much nearer to that side than 
to the extreme opinion that lies so much farther in the 
opposite direction. 

It would not be possible, on an occasion like this, to 
enter into an examination of the conflicting arguments 
and testimony respecting Richard's memory, but the ques- 
tion respecting his bodily deformity will serve to illustrate 
the nature of the controversy as to his character. The 
Richard of the drama speaks of himself 

" As rudely stamped, curtailed of fair proportions, 
Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,- 
Deformed, unfinished, — sent before my time 
Into this breathing world, — scarce half made up. 
And that so lamely and unfashionable. 
That dogs bark at me, as I halt by them." 



318 LECTURE TENTH. 



Now, ttis is dramatic exaggeration — it is intended to 
be so ; it is not meant for description, as persons who 
read unimaginatively misconstrue it, but is meant for 
Ri chard's morbid exaggeration of bis own personal defects, 
especially as felt in envious contrast with tbe elegance of 
face and form of bis voluptuous brother, Edward the 
Fourth. This utterance of malignant and spiteful feel- 
ing ought never to be mistaken for literal description ; 
for though men have what Madame de Sevigne, I believe, 
calls the privilege of ugliness, it would be a supernatural 
abuse of that privilege, if a man were, as Richard speaks 
of himself, so ugly as to set the dogs barking. So it is 
throughout tha play: the references to Richard's per- 
sonal appearance are, and are intended to be, exaggera- 
tions of dramatic passion. 

But the general popular impression as to Richard's 
bodily unsightliness, seems to show how intense was the 
hatred of his character — ^how odious the recollection of 
his life. The detestation which he had inspired aggra- 
vated the conception of his personal defects : and he was, 
perhaps, thought tenfold more deformed than he really 
was, because his body was the visible exponent of the 
spiritual deformity of his nature. If Richard was the 
comely person his modern apologists maintain^ then the 
notion of his deformity could have its origin only in 
the deep conviction of the inhuman wickedness of his 
invisible nature : men must have made him crooked and 
hideous because his life was so. There is an ingenious 
and humorous essay of Charles Lamb's, on the danger of 
confounding moral with personal deformity, in which he 
remarks, among other illustrations, '' that crooked old 
woman, I once said, speaking of an ancient gentlewoman, 



THE REIGN OF EICHARD THE THIRD. 319 



whose actions did not square altogether with my notions 
of the rule of right. The unanimous surprise of the com- 
pany, before whom I uttered these words, convinced me 
that I had confounded mental with bodily obliquity, and 
that there was nothing tortuous about the old lady but her 
deeds/^* Now, if this mistake occurred with regard to 
King Richard, it proves that if the physical deformity 
was not there, the moral deformity, in all probability, 
was. 

It would be both an idle and impossible inquiry to seek 
to ascertain the degree of Richard's bodily deformity, 
but the fact of some deformity appears highly probable, 
and, indeed, has an historical significancy in connection 
with the almost incredible inhumanity of his character. 
The consciousness of bodily deformity, even though it be 
slight, is found to embitter minds of a certain cast — to 
poison their spirits — and, by wrenching their dispositions 
from their natural course of feeling, to fit them for un- 
natural paroxysms of passion, or for envenomed ferocity 
against their more favoured fellow-men. In other minds, 
more happily constituted, the same consciousness proves 
altogether innocuous, and like any other inscrutable afflic- 
tion, it subdues and softens the spirit without making it 
savage. Remember, for instance, how different was the 
influence of such consciousness upon the character of Sir 
Walter Scott and Lord Byron, afflicted as they were with 
much the same kind of bodily defect. It is well observed 
by Mr. Lockhart, in his biography of Scott, that the novel 
of the Black Dwarf derives "a singular interest from the 
delineation of the dark feelings so often connected with 

* Lamb's Prose Works, vol. i. p. 246. 



LECTURE TENTH. 



physical deformity — feelings which appear to have diffused 
their shadow over the whole genius of Byron ; and which, 
but for this single picture, we should hardly have con- 
ceived to have passed through Scott's happier mind. 
All the bitter blasphemy of spirit which, from infancy to 
the tomb, swelled up in Byron against the unkindness of 
nature, which sometimes perverted even his filial love into 
a sentiment of diabolical malignity, all this black and de- 
solate train of reflection must have been encountered and 
deliberately subdued by the manly parent of the Black 
Dwarf.'^* 

The dark record, which history has made of Richard's 
life and reign, becomes the more credible when we reflect 
upon this desolating and demoralizing influence of the 
consciousness of deformity. Shakspeare's profound philo- 
sophy is shown in his making this an element in Richard's 
character. He is represented as feeling himself marked 
by nature to stand apart from his fellow-men — separated 
from the species. He stands in utter and awful moral 
loneliness; and as all social feeling is extinguished, the 
humanity of his nature dies with it, and all that is left is an 
almost supernatural selfishness, proud and self-assured — 

^*I that have neither pity, love, nor fear; 
I have no brother, I am like no brother, 
And this word love, which gray-beards call divine. 
Be resident in men like one another, 
And not in me. I am myself alone." 

I have several times adverted to the peculiar signifi- 
cancy of the opening scenes of Shakspeare's plays, and it 



Life of Scott, vol. v. p. 175. 



THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE THIRD. 321 



may now be observed, tbat of tbem all, Richard tbe Third 
is the only one that opens with a soliloquy, as if to indi- 
cate the moral solitariness of the character. 

The career of such unusual and savage self-dependence 
could be sustained only by the power of commanding in- 
tellect. Accordingly, there is found in Richard such 
power in all its magnitude : there is intellect, and nothing 
but intellect. Coleridge has observed, that " pride of in- 
tellect is the characteristic of Richard, and that Shaks- 
peare has here, as in all his great parts, developed in a 
tone of sublime morality the dreadful consequences of 
placing the moral in subordination to the mere intellectual 
being.'^* Struggling first for the aggrandizement of his 
family, Richard struggles afterwards for himself. To 
bravery in battle he adds craft and hypocrisy, because he 
finds them the best instruments for some purposes, and 
not because he is solicitous to screen his crimes from the 
world or himself. He feels his intellectual strength, and 
has an exulting pride in the exercise of it. He was one 
of these bold bad men, who rise up in revolutionary times, 
when ambitious and unprincipled nobles stoop from their 
high station to the vilest arts of the low-born demagogue ; 
one of those aristocratic Jacobins, who are seen in seasons 
of anarchy, seeking to build up a tyranny on the ruins of 
their own order. Richard is arrogant with the pride of 
birth and the recollection of past dangers, as when he 
boasts — 

" I was born so high 
Our aicry buildeth in the cedar's-top, 
And dallies with the wind and scorns the sun." 



* Lectures on Shakspeare and other Dramatists, vol. i. p. 187. 
21 



LECTURE TENTH. 



The intense intellectual force of Kichard's character, 
with the utter absence of moral elements^ produces 
throughout an overweening self-assurance that is troubled 
with no misgivings, but breaks out perpetually into a 
species of malignant merriment. He is so sure of his 
game always, that he exults in anticipation of success, and 
vents his exuberance of spirits in that most hateful mode 
of expression, sarcastic irony — one of the sure signs*' of a 
bad heart. When he is planning his brother's murder, 
he looks after him as he is led to the Tower : 

" Go tread the path that thou shalt ne'er return. 
Simple plain Clarence, I do love thee so, 
That I will shortly send thy soul to heaven, 
If Heaven will take the present at our hands," 

His exultation rises at the prospect of the death of his 
other brother, Edward the Fourth : 

" If I fail not in my deep intent, 
Clarence hath not another day to live. 
Which done, God take King Edward to his mercy, 
And leave the world for me to bustle in." 

The Duke of Buckingham has been the mean and wicked 
partner of Eichard's usurpation. The strong man has 
whirled him along in the progress of his crimes — ^he has 
used him, not as a staff to lean on, but a tool to subserve 
his purposes. The moment the frail Buckingham falters 
at the proposed murder of the princes, Eichard casts 
him off as a worthless thing to be trampled on without 
fear or compunction : 

" I will converse with iron-witted fools 
And unrespective boys; none are for me 
That look into me with considerate eyes. 



THE REIGN OF RICHARD THE THIRD. 



High-reaching Buckingham grows circumspect; 
The deep-revolving, witty Buckingham 
No more shall be the neighbour to my counsels. 
Hath he so long held out with me untired, 
And stops he now for breath ? Well, be it so.'* 

The fate of this wicked and discarded favourite is sealed. 
He feels that it is not enough that he is degraded — he 
must die ; and, after a vain struggle against his destiny, 
his partnership with the usurper's crimes ends with a 
bloody death by the tyrant's order. 

Immediately after Eichard has cast Buckingham from 
his counsels, he looks about for other men, more pliant 
implements ; and he recovers his wonted animation when 
he utters that cold-blooded piece of irony in the question 
to Tyrrel — 

" Dar'st thou resolve to kill a friend of mine ?" 

exactly as if murder was a perfectly amicable trans- 
action. 

Richard's short reign of three years was a weary 
period ; and, whether we look at his character in history 
or in the drama, we escape from it with pleasure, for 
there is nothing to relieve — nothing to mitigate it. The 
contemplation of even his commanding intellect — the 
tremendous force of his will — ^becomes odious ; for we see 
that it owes much of its strength to abandonment of all 
principle of right. It is one of the dreadful lessons of 
history, that men have often risen to power simply by 
what has been well described as — " The fearful resolve to 
find, in the will alone, the one absolute motive of action, 
under which all other motives, from within and from 
without, must either be subordinated or crushed;" men 



LECTURE TENTH. 



who, knowing no other principle but that might is right, 
are " the Molochs of human nature, who are indebted for 
the larger part of their meteoric success to their total 
want of principle, and who surpass the generality of their 
fellow-creatures in one act of courage only — that of 
daring to say with their whole heart — ^Evil, be thou 
my good I' '"^ 

It is not possible to discover either in the history or 
the drama of Richard a single point for even a momentary 
sympathy to rest on — there is no room for the least tran- 
sient pity of the misery of guilt. Richard had no suffer- 
ing that we can see — ^he is happy in his crimes, and they 
make him prouder of his power. He has no compunctions 
of conscience, no remorseful remembrances ; and it is in 
this he is represented so differently from the Scottish 
usurper and tyrant. There is scope for a grand contrast 
between Richard and Macbeth, but let me only notice 
that never from Richard's lips do we hear the piteous 
utterance of the guilt-oppressed weariness of life that 
weighed down the once guiltless spirit of Macbeth. 

Richard never felt that he had lived long enough ; 
and, as to troops of friends, the lonely-hearted and proud 
man set no value on them. The tyrant's indurated and 
stony conscience seemed to sustain with ease the awfol 
superstructure of his crimes; the prospect of what he 
thought a necessity of more and more guilt — " sin pluck- 
ing on sin" — disturbs him with no such agony of ineffect- 
ual reluctance as that which appears in Macbeth's brief 
utterance to Lady Macbeth — 

" Oh, full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife !"' 
* Coleridge's Statesman's Manual. Appendix B, p. 262. 



THE REIGN OP RICHARD THE THIRD. 325 



When Ricliard's crimes are perpetrated, lie seems to 
think of them no more — ^by a strong effort of the will, he 
dismisses them from his mind. The guilty past is no 
burden to him ; there is no such heart-wasting, hopeless 
memory as appears in the solemn irony of Macbeth' s words 
to the physician : 

" Canst thou not minister to a mind diseased ? 
Pluck from the memory a rooted sorrow, 
Raze out the written troubles of the brain. 
And with some sweet oblivious antidote, 
Cleanse the stuff'd bosom of that perilous stuff 
Which weighs upon the heart ?" 

The long-sustained obduracy of Richard's spirit at 
length breaks down, like that of the strong-willed woman, 
Lady Macbeth, in the mysterious condition of perturbed 
sleep. The waking tyrant never loses his self-command, 
but the pride of his wicked heart is shaken by fearful 
visions of the night; it is only when appalled by them 
that conscience begins to assert its authority on the eve 
of his death. It is a curious fact, that what might be 
regarded as a mere dramatic invention — I mean the 
agitated dream of Richard on the eve of the battle of 
Bosworth Field — is supposed to have an historical foun- 
dation, and is treated by accurate historians as of actual 
occurrence. The story is, that Richard, rising from his 
fearful sleep, harrassed and haggard and disturbed, found 
it necessary, as battle was about to be joined, to explain 
to his attendants the change which had come over his 
spirit, and which his looks betrayed. When the myste- 
rious shapes, which in his dream hovered around his 
couch, are represented by the poet as the ghosts of those 
who had been murdered by him, it is to be interpreted as 



LECTURE TENTH. 



the embodiment of the hauntings of a guilty conscience — 
the presence of remorse made vocal and visible. It seems 
monstrous, either in scenic representation or in the mere 
reading of the play, to find the ghosts set down among 
the persons of the drama — ghosts enumerated along with 
citizens, soldiers, and the rest ; but they are not so to be 
thought of; if Richard's dream on the night before the 
battle is an historical fact, then the poet has given it a 
sublime moral significancy, by idealizing the horrid phan- 
toms of sleep into the shadowy form of the dead whose 
blood had stained the tyrant's hands. The long and un- 
checked career of guilt had so closed the avenues to 
Richard's conscience, that nothing but a miracle or the 
mysterious agencies of sleep could open the way to it ; 
and thus, in the first awakening from his vexed sleep, 
the terrors of conscience throng around him for the first 
time : 

" My conscience hath a thousand several tongues, 
And every tongue brings in a several tale, 
And every tale condemns me for a villain. 
Perjury, perjury in the high'st degree, 
Murder, stern murder, in the direst degree. 
All several sins, all used in each degree, 
Throng to the bar, crying all — Guilty ! guilty ! 
I shall despair. There is no creature loves me. 
And if I die, no soul will pity me. 
Nay, wherefore should they ? since that I myself 
Find in myself no pity to myself. 
Methought, the souls of all that I had murdered 
Came to my tent, and every one did threat 
To-morrow's vengeance on the head of Richard." 

The terror of Richard's dream did not unman him 
when danger came in the more familiar form of an armed 



THE REIGN OP HENRY THE EIGHTH. 327 



enemy, and the last of tlie Plantagenets fell/ fighting 
with a bravery worthy of that heroic race which had 
reigned in England for more than three hundred years, 
and which now reached a bloody catastrophe on Bosworth 
Field. The crown of England, which had been carried 
by Richard to the battle, being found after the fight was 
over, was placed on the brow of the Earl of Richmond, 
who, on the field of his victory, was hailed " King Henry 
the Seventh.^' 

The fii*st of the Tudor kings held the throne by con- 
quest, and by his Lancastrian blood; and a matrimonial 
alliance with the family of York gave further security to 
his possession. To borrow the fine image of Mr. Hallam 
— "Lest the spectre of indefeasible right should stand 
once more in arms on the tomb of the house of York, the 
two houses of parliament showed an earnest desire for 
the king's marriage with the daughter of Edward the 
Fourth, who, if she should bear only the name of royalty, 
might transmit an undisputed inheritance of its preroga- 
tive to her posterity.^^* The child of that marriage, 
Henry the Eighth, succeeded to the throne with the first 
undisputed title that England had known for more than 
one hundred years. The beginning of the reign of Henry 
the Eighth is just at the transition period from mediaeval 
to modern history, when the feudal baronial power had 
been exhausted by the War of the Roses, and the 
monarchy, gaining strength from the ruin of the nobility, 
had been further fortified by the sagacious dominion of 
Henry the Seventh. At the opening of the sixteenth 
century, England takes its place in history as one of the 

* Hallam's Constitutional History, vol. i. p. 12, 



LECTURE TENTH. 



great monarchies of Europe about the same time that 
the monarchal polity of France attained a similar su- 
premacy. 

In the progress of the constitutional government of 
England, and for the ultimate advancement of constitu 
tional freedom, the work which appears to have been 
assigned to the Tudor generation of kings was, the extin- 
guishing of the multitudinous tyranny of a feudal aristo- 
cracy ; and this was accomplished by the elevation of the 
monarchal element in the government. At no period of 
English history has there been such an imperious tone 
and such arbitrary conduct employed by the kings as 
under the Tudor dynasty — a succession of tyrants from 
the seventh Henry to Elizabeth, who wrought the mo- 
narchy to such a pitch of prerogative, that the lofty pile 
fell to its foundation during the Stuart dynasty, when 
Charles the First laid his head on the block. 

Before passing to what must be a very rapid view of 
the period of history that remains, let me call your atten- 
tion to the fact, that the drama of Henry the Eighth was 
composed by Shakspeare at the distance of only a little 
more than half a century from the events which it illus- 
trates. These events are, it is true, now seen by us 
through the haze of a longer time; but to the poet and 
his contemporaries, they had all the distinctness of com- 
paratively recent occurrences ; and, as such, the imagina- 
tion had a difficult task in dealing with them. The 
poetic process, when employed on subjects of a recent 
and familiar nature, must needs be managed with excel- 
lent judgment and high imagination; to Shakspeare, 
therefore, the subject of Henry the Eighth was very 
much what the period of "Washington's administration, or 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE EIGHTH. 329 



the reign of Greorge the Third or Louis the Sixteenth, 
would be to a dramatic poet of the present day. The 
character of the play is, on this account, in many respects 
different from that of his other " Chronicle-Plays /^ lofty 
as is the poetry in it, the whole tone of it eminently 
shows how Shakspeare's genius takes rank with history. 
The play of Henry the Eighth is history, and history in 
its highest and purest state. 

Coleridge said of this play that — " It is a sort of histo- 
rical masque, or show-play.''* It opens with a descrip- 
tion of the gorgeous meeting of King Henry and the 
French monarch, Francis the First, at the " field of the 
cloth of gold,'' and it ends with the procession at the 
christening of Queen Elizabeth. The deep interest of 
the play, however, is not in its scenes of pomp and dis- 
play, but in the silence and stillness of the tragic misery 
that it tells of. 

In previous reigns we have seen the monarchy of Eng- 
land swayed or sustained by the great nobles — princes of 
the blood or potent feudal barons — standing round the 
throne; but the great change that has come over the 
kingdom in this respect is apparent, when we see, in 
Henry's time, that the mightiest man in the realm, one 
who controls even the tyrant's policy, and guides the 
government, is a low-born commoner; who, rising upon 
church preferment, becomes the chancellor of the king- 
dom and the king's chief minister. The politic states- 
manship of Cardinal Wolsey is a power that transcends 
what was displayed by the great Earl of "Warwick or any 
of the early feudal baronage. The early part of the 

* Literary Remains, vol. ii. p. 91. 



LECTURE TENTH. 



drama represents the angry and resentful pride of tlie 
nobles, as they fret under tlie pomp and power of tlie 
great cardinal^ whose splendid ambition has mounted 
over all the high born of the land. The impetuous Duke 
of Buckingham with rash passion provokes a controversy, 
and braves the authority of Wolsey; but the moment 
that power strikes him, he feels — 

"The net has fallen upon me. * * * 
* * * My life is spann'd already : 
I am the shadow of poor Buckingham, 
Whose figure even this instant cloud puts on, 
By dark'ning my clear sun." 

He dies on the scaffold, and his death is a bloody pro- 
clamation of Wolsey's power. 

The tragic part of the drama is made up of a succes- 
sion of changes from grandeur to debasement ; and the 
next in the series is the downfall of Queen Catharine, 
repudiated as a wife and degraded from the throne. 
Her storv is a familiar one, which I need not trace and 
I cannot now pause to expatiate on. Let it be borne in 
mind that Catharine of Arragon, when she came to Eng- 
land, betrothed to the heir of England's throne, brought, 
as the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella, not only her 
splendid dowry, but the pride of the proudest monarchy 
of Europe; she came from the palace that had lately 
rejoiced in those wondrous achievements by which the 
spaces of Christendom were enlarged; for in one and the 
same year did Ferdinand and Isabella remove from the 
soil of Spain the long-enduring dynasty of the Saracens, 
and send forth Columbus to search the dark waters of 
the West. For near twenty years was this proud Cas- 
tilian woman Queen of England, the honoured wife of 



THE REIGN OP HENRY THE EIGHTH. 331 



Henry tlie Eiglith. The poet-historian, I will not say 
narrates, but exhibits with historical fidelity the course 
of proceeding by which Catharine was wickedly cast 
aside to make room for Anne Boleyn. There cannot 
be any thing more impressive or affecting, than the va- 
riety and revulsions of feeling that pass over the afflicted 
spirit of this queenly matron, whether we behold her in 
stately yet suppliant remonstrance with her heartless hus- 
band, or — ^beleaguered by the crafty counsels of the two 
cardinals, Wolsey and Campeius — she turns from the 
king to address a more impassioned utterance to Wolsey : 

" Sir, 
I am about to weep ; but, thinking that 
We are a queen, (or long have dreamed so,) certain 
The daughter of a king, my drops of tears 
m turn to sparks of fire." 

In a former part of this course, we had occasion to 
consider the character of Constance wildly clamouring 
for her son's royal claim, and afterwards that of Margaret 
of Anjou indomitably warring for her son's inheritance; 
but the noblest matron of them all is Queen Catharine, 
in whom are seen all the feelings of the wife, the mo- 
ther, and the queen — the pride of birth and of place — 
the consciousness of irreproachable purity — the anguish 
of the bitterest wrong — the sense of loneliness in a fo- 
reign land — all sinking down with something of placid 
piety, into the most piteous dejection. She knows how 
desolate she is — 

" Shipwreck'd upon a kingdom where no pity, 
No friends, no hope; no kindred weep for me," 
Almost no grave allowed me." 



LECTURE TENTH. 



But almost in the same breath she has the fortitude to 
say to Wolsey — 

" My lord, I dare not make myself so guilty 
To give up willingly that noble title 
Tour master wed me to : nothing but death 
Shall e'er divorce my dignities." 

She had warned the great cardinal — 

" Take heed, for heaven's sake, take heed, lest at once 
The burden of my sorrows fall upon ye." 

The next of these sublime reverses — the change from 
^^ mightiness to misery^^ — ^is the downfall of Wolsey. The 
worldly and ambitious ecclesiastic had been odious in his 
pride of power — in his days of magnificence; but now, 
with no more than the actual facts of history, the poet, 
as has been well said — ^'By his marvellous art, throws 
the fallen man upon our pity. He restores him to his 
fellowship with humanity by his temporal abasement. 
The trappings of his ambition are stripped off, and we 
see him in his natural dignity. He puts on the armour 
of fortitude and we reverence him.^' 

Wolsey had dwelt in an atmosphere so radiant as to 
dazzle him; but now a sudden change of fortune sweeps 
it away, and he sees the world in the pure air and calm 
light of heaven. He bids farewell to all his greatness 
in a strain of poetry, not as piteous, certainly, but as 
heartfelt as that with which the soul-stricken soldier 
bade farewell to the plumed steed and the big wars that 
make ambition virtue. There is the lingering sorrow 
for lost power — 

" No sun shall usher forth my honours, 
Nor gild again the noble troops that waited 
Upon my smiles." 



THE llEIGN OF HENRY THE EIGHTH. 333 



He looks sorrowfully to the destitution that is before 
him — 

" My high-blown pride 
At length broke under mej and now has left me 
Weary and old with service, to the mercy 
Of a rude stream that must forever hide me.'* 

It is not until the tears and the affection of his servant 
Cromwell touch the hidden humanity in the proud man's 
heart, that Wolsey rises to the higher strain of that 
solemn admonition : 

" Mark but my fall and that that ruin'd me. 
Cromwell, I charge thee, fling away ambition. 
By that sin fell the angels — how can man, then, 
The image of his Maker, hope to win by it ? 
Love thyself last ; cherish those hearts that hate thee. 
Corruption wins not more than honesty. 
Still in thy right hand carry gentle peace 
To silence envious tongues. Be just and fear not. 
Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's. 
Thy God's, and truth's : then, if thou fall'st, Cromwell, 
Thou fall'st a blessed martyr." 

The dramatic narrative of the close of Wolsey' s life 
becomes manyfold more impressive from being told to 
the discrowned Queen Catherine in answer to her gentle 
inquiry — 

" Did'st thou not tell me 
That the great child of honour, Cardinal Wolsey, 
Was dead? 

* * * * 

Prythee, good GriflBth, tell me how he died : 
If well, he stepp'd before me, happily, 
For my example."--- 

* It is observed by Lord Campbell, in his Lives of the Chancellors 
of England, that the subsequent part of Henry's reign is the best 



334 LECTURE TENTH. 



And then, after she has listened to the narrative of his 
deeds of beneficence and his death of humility, her gentle 
comment — 

"After my death I wish no other herald, 
No other speaker of my living actions. 
To keep mine honour from corruption, 
But such an honest chronicler as Griffith. 
Whom I most hated living, thou hast made me, 
With thy religious truth and modesty. 
Now in his ashes honour : Peace he with him !" 

This forgetfulness of her injuries — ^this placid forgiveness 
of her adversary — is made to be the appropriate prelude 
to her own death. Through the subdued emotions of 
charity to the memory of the dead, and of resignation to 
her own woes, the Castilian pride of the noble-minded 
and afflicted Catharine shines forth faintly in her dying 
injunctions to her attendants : 

"Although unqueen'd, yet like ♦ 

A queen, and daughter to a king, inter me.'* 



panegyric on Wolsey ; for, during twenty-nine years, he had kept free 
from the stain of hlood or violence the sovereign, who now, following 
the natural bent of his character, cut off the heads of his wives and 
his most virtuous ministers, and proved himself the most arbitrary 
tyrant that ever disgraced the throne of England. 

The same author, in closing the biography of Wolsey, remarks : — 
" I shall not attempt to draw any general character of this eminent 
man. His good and bad qualities may best be understood from the. 
details of his actions, and are immortalized by the dialogue between 
Queen Catharine and Griffith, her secretary, which is familiar to every 
reader." 

Nothing need be added to a dialogue which has been well de- 
scribed as "not merely the noblest poetic impersonation, but the most 
fair and impartial historic estimate, of Wolsey's character." H. R. 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE EIGHTH. 335 



The tragedy of Henry the Eighth gives intimation of 
the vast changes that were approaching. The great 
ecclesiastical revolution of the sixteenth century is dis- 
tantly alluded tO; when Wolsey speaks of Anne Boleyn as 
a spleeny Lutheran, and of Cranmer's rise : 

" There is sprung up 
An heretic, an arch one, Cranmer; one 
Hath crawled into the favour of the king, 
And is his oracle." 

And, looking forward into one of the last allusions in 
Shakspeare's historical plays, it is to America, when, in 
poetic anticipation of the reign of James the First, 
it is said — 

"Wherever the bright sun of heaven shall shine, 
His honour and the greatness of his name 
Shall be and make new nations. He shall flourish, 
And, like a mountain cedar, reach his branches 
To aU the plains about him." 

Of the character of Henry the Eighth it may be said, 
without exaggeration, that it contained all the worst quali- 
ties of the worst man that ever reigned in England. 
Despotic over the nation, he carried a bloody and inhu- 
man tyranny into his own household ; and all the time 
he was so busy handling his conscience, fondling it, and 
talking about it, and the distress its tenderness caused 
him, and his scruples and his sense of duty ; so that he 
seems to have lived and died in the self-complacent con- 
viction that he was one of the most virtuous, and certainly 
the most conscientious, creature in the world. Strange 
to say, too, his subjects seem to have had an abject 



LECTURE TENTH. 



affection for him ; and, with a series of atrocities indis- 
putably resting upon his memory, posterity has but im- 
perfectly fulfilled its duty of hatred of him. The expla- 
nation given of this by Mr. Hallam is thus : — " The main 
cause of the reverence with which our forefathers cherished 
this king's memory was, the share he had taken in the 
Reformation. They saw him, not, indeed, the proselyte 
of their faith, but the subverter of their enemy^s power 
— the avenging minister of heaven, by whose great arm 
the chain of superstition had been broken and the prison- 
gates burst asunder. As the poet G-ray has finely glanced 
at this part of his history when he speaks of him as — 

'* The majestic lord 
That broke the bonds of Rome.'* 

A curious explanation of the inadequate condemnation 
of Henry's character is given by another writer, who 
remarks : — " It is extremely difficult to attach any moral 
responsibility to one who appears to have been so ut- 
terly unconscious of it himself. We cannot contemplate 
murder and robbery apart from the homicide and the 
felon. No reader ever throws down his book in disgust at 
the revolting character of Bluebeard; few experience any 
personal abhorrence at the Emperor of Morocco, though 
his courtyard is ornamented with pyramids of human 
heads, freshly furnished every day. History is unfortu- 
nately nowise deficient in examples of graduated barba- 
rity to suit any conceivable occasion; but its moral would 
be lost and its occupation gone, if it could not also gene- 
rally exhibit the temporal wages of sin. Even Caligula 
used to wander through the measureless and hollow- 
sounding corridors of the palace, followed by gibbering 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE EIGHTH. 337 



phantoms and eagerly praying for the dawn. Even Nero 
started at the unearthly trumpet which sounded nightly 
over the grave of his murdered mother.* Even Charles 
the Ninth saw bloody streaks in the sky, and heard 
strange noises on the leads of the Louvre. But no 
remorse ever disturbed the rest or affected the dreams of 
Henry. No occasional misgivings that he was not the 
best king, the most faithful Catholic, the truest friend, 
the most loving husband in Christendom, ever crossed 
the royal mind. Wife after wife, friend after friend, 
councillor after councillor, perished by the axe of his 
slaves ; but no troublesome spectres stalked through the 
groves of Richmond or marred the tiltings at Greenwich. 
At last, his own familiar friend is condemned; but no 
blood-boltered Cromwell rises at the council-board or 
shakes his gory locks in St. Gleorge's Hall. The uncon- 
scious monarch continues his murders and his marriages, 
troubled by nothing but the gout, and lamenting nothing 
but his poverty, and dies at last committing his soul to 
the Blessed Virgin with as much confidence and compla- 
cency as if he had lived the life of Fran§ois Xavier. 
When we include, in our recollections of this man, the 
facts that he was destined for the Archbishopic of Can- 
terbury, that he gravely discussed theological questions, 
propounded and defended theses of divinity, and ear- 
nestly and vehemently disputed on serious points of reli- 
gion, it is enough to confuse the gravity of our reason 



* Tacitus Ann. xiv. 10. " Quia tamen non, ut hominum vultus, ita 
locorum facies mutantur, obversabaturque maris illius et litorum gravis 
adspectus (et erant, qui crederent, sonitum tubae collibus circum editis 
planctusque tumulo matris audiri) Neapolim concessit." W. B. R. 

22 



LECTURE TENTH. 



and judgment, and to give to tlie whole of his reign 
and actions the air of a grotesque and barbarous pan- 
tomime." 

I should have been glad, in coming to the end of the 
many historic personages whom we have been considering, 
to have closed with one whose memory could be regarded 
with less of detestation; but, as I have no choice, I would 
fain help you to as hearty hatred of Henry the Eighth as 
historic truth demands. I cannot add force to the lan- 
guage of an author who has said — ^' It is fearful, but not 
unsalutary, to cast a parting glance at Henry the Eighth 
after his work upon the earth was done. His broad and 
vicious body lay immovable and helpless, a mere corrupt 
and bloated mass of dying tyranny. No friend was near 
to comfort it, not even a courtier dared to warn it of its 
coming hour. The men whom it had gorged with the 
offal of its plunder, hung back in affright from its perish- 
ing agonies, in disgust from its ulcerous sores. It could 
not move a limb nor lift a hand. The palace-doors were 
made wider for its passage through them, and it could 
only then pass by means of machinery. Yet, to the last, 
it kept its ghastly state, descended daily from bedcham- 
ber into room of kingly audience, through a hole in the 
palace ceiling, and was nightly, by the same means, lifted 
back again to its sleepless bed. And, to the last, unhap- 
pily for the world, it had its terrible indulgences. Before 
stretched in that helpless state of horror, its latest victim 
had been a Plantagenet. Nearest to itself in blood of all 
its living kindred, the Countess of Salisbury was, in her 
eightieth year, dragged to the scaffold for no pretended 
crime save that of corresponding with her son; and, 
having refused to lay her head on the block, (it was for 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE EIGHTH. 339 



traitors to do so, she said, which she was not,) but, 
moving swiftly round, and tossing it from side to side 
to avoid the executioner, she was struck down by the 
weapons of the neighbouring men-at-arms; and, while 
her gray hairs streamed with blood, and her neck was 
forcibly held down, the axe discharged, at length, its 
dreadful office. The last victim of all followed in the 
graceful and gallant person of the young Lord Surrey. 
The dying tyranny, speechless and incapable of motion, 
had its hand lifted up to affix the formal seal to the 
death-warrant of the poet, the soldier, the statesman, 
and scholar, and on the ^ day of the execution,^ according 
to Holinshed, ^ was itself lying in the agonies of death.' 
Its miserable comfort then was, the thought that youth 
was dying too ; that the grave which yawned for abused 
health, indulged lusts, and monstrous crimes, had, in the 
same instant opened at the feet of manly health, of gene- 
rous grace, of exquisite genius, and modest virtue. And 
so perished Henry the Eighth.'^* 

And here, just across the threshold of modern, as 
distinguished from mediaeval, history, this course of 
lectures comes to its conclusion. When I think of the 
distant period of history with which this course began, 
I am almost afraid to think of the extent of time and the 
multitude of characters I have attempted to speak of. 
With a very strong sense of the necessity of leaving a 
vast deal unsaid, and of the danger of passing over 
what ought not to be neglected, I have used all pos- 
sible pains to make the most of the time you have 
kindly given me. I part with my subject at present 

*' Forster's Treatise on Popular Progress, p. 48. 



3i0 LECTURE TENTH. 



with the hope that, hereafter, I may possibly resume 
it, by treating either some of the many grand historical 
subjects which remain in the period of the Middle Ages, 
or by advancing into the ampler field of modern his- 
tory, and onward into the neglected annals of our own 
country.* 

Let me add a word or two of explanation respecting 
the method of the course I am now concluding. In 
it, I have purposely refrained, as far as possible, from 
mere historic narrative, and have aimed at such com- 
prehensive comment as might illustrate the character and 
spirit of those distant times, and of the men who lived 
in them. I ventured to hope that in this way I might 
revive some historical recollections — might deepen some 
historical impressions, and, perhaps, inspire an interest 
in the study of history. 

With regard to the poetical illustrations which I 
have introduced from Shakspeare's " Chronicle-Plays,'^ 
I wish to explain, that I have not thought it worth 
while to occupy your time with pointing out the de- 
viations in those plays from the literal truth of his- 
tory. I have used those illustrations as contributing 
to the general truth of history — to its moral signifi- 
cancy, and because I had it at heart to show that by 
the help of the imagination, disciplined in the service 
of truth, we gain that sense of the reality of past ages, 
and of our fellow-beings who peopled them, which makes 
history a living picture. 

To these words of explanation let me add that I 
very heartily feel the kindness and attention for which 

* These hopes, alas, were never fulfilled. W. B, R. 



THE REIGN OF HENRY THE EIGHTH. 341 



I am indebted to the class. That kindness has been 
a very great encouragement while I have been going 
on with the preparation of these lectures; it furnishes 
me with most agreeable recollections, and the hope of a 
recurrence of your friendliness; if a similar intercourse 
should hereafter be renewed. 



FOUR LECTURES 



ON 



TRAGIC POETRY, 



AS ILLUSTRATED IN 



'feafegeTO's ^mx #mt Mxmn. 



TEAGIC POETHY, 



LECTURE I.* 



The subject wliicli I ask you to carry in your thoughts 
during this brief course of lectures is — '' Tragic Poetry, 
especially as illustrated by the four great dramas of Shak- 
speare/' I do not propose to enter upon a strictly criti- 
cal examination of these tragedies. I dwell upon them 
as they are illustrative of the aim and the scope of tragic 
poetry. I wish to inquire, how a true poet deals with the 
human heart when he awakens its solemn s^Tiapathies, 
and why it is that such sympathies — the sentiments of 
pity, sorrow, and even anguish — are stirred within the 
soul by the agency of the imagination. 

When I speak of the four great dramas of Shakspeare, 
I trust it is understood, that I am not expressing 
merely a private preference of my own — an individual 
judgment. Universal consent has recognised them as 



December 6th, 1842. 



346 LECTURE FIRST. 



undoubtedly the highest efforts of his genius ; and; what 
I wish you to observe is^ that when the inspiration of the 
poet was in its loftiest region, that region was "Tragedy/^ 
The upper air of poetry is the atmosphere of sorrow. 
This is a truth attested by every department of art — the 
poetry of words — of music — of the canvas and of marble. 
Now, as poetry is a glorified reflection of life and nature, 
why is this ? Simply because, when a man weeps, the 
passions that are stirring within him are mightier than 
those feelings which prompt to cheerfulness and merri- 
ment. The smile plays upon the countenance ; the laugh 
is a momentary and noisy impulse; but the tear rises 
slowly and silently from the deep places of the heart. It 
is at once the symbol and the relief of overwhelming 
feeling — it is the language of those emotions which 
words cannot give utterance to. Words and smiles 
and laughter all have to do with impulses that are on 
the surface, and which we freely express to one another 
in the trivial and social intercourse of daily life ; but let 
any one study his own heart, and he will know that there 
are passions, whose very might and depth give them a 
sanctity, which we instinctively recognise by veiling them 
from the gaze of others. They are the sacred things of 
the temple of the human soul, and the common touch 
would only profane them. In childhood, indeed, when 
its little griefs and joys are blended with that absence of 
self-consciousness which is both the bliss and the beauty 
of its innocence, tears are shed without restraint or dis- 
guise. But, when the self-consciousness of manhood has 
taught us that tears are the expression of those passions 
which are too sacred for exposure, the heart will often in 
silence break rather than violate this admirable instinct 



KING LEAR. 347 



of our nature. Indeed^ the more a man reflects on these 
things, the more confirmed will be the spirit of reserve 
in him — the more will he shrink from ^^ wearing his heart 
upon his sleeve." Hence it is that the highest depart- 
ment of poetic art belongs to tragedy, embracing, as it 
does, in its range the most awful emotions that human 
nature is capable of — an old man's agony from the 
wrongs of filial impiety^ as in King Lear; the heart- 
wasting misery of criminal temptations and a blood- 
stained conscience, as in Macbeth ; the strife of a young 
and noble spirit contending with vice and an adverse 
destiny, as in Hamlet; and the phrensy of an abandoned 
faith, as in Othello. 

If it has been shown that the highest department of 
the art belongs to tragic poetry, assuming, as it may do, 
either the epic or the dramatic form, it may still be 
asked — What are its moral uses ? The inquiry is a just 
one ; and, to the best of my ability, I will endeavour in 
some degree to give an answer to it — on this condition, 
however, that I am not expected to answer it in any mere 
utilitarian spirit. Indeed, one main design of these four 
lectures will be to show what salutary influences belong 
to tragic poetry — how the poet's sad imaginings are cal- 
culated to chasten, to elevate, and to purify — an agency 
which justified so sage and solemn a spirit as Milton's in 
styling the lofty, grave tragedians — 

" In chorus or iambic, teachers best 
Of moral prudence, with delight received, 
In brief sententious precepts, while they treat 
Of fate, and chance, and change in human life ; 
High actions and high passions best describing."* 

•'!■ Paradise Regained, book ir. ver. 261. 



LECTURE FIRST. 



"When Milton tlius spake^ it was in immediate reference 
to the Athenian tragic drama; but the words have a 
more universal application as finely describing the themes 
of all tragedy : 

" Fate, and chance, and change in human life, 
High actions and high passions best describing j" 

themes involving what is most momentous in man's moral 
nature. The great poet, in all ages of the world, has 
been a genuine moralist; and, when morality perished 
upon the pages of philosophy, it has been kept alive by 
the inspirations of poetry. Most of all has the tragic 
poet best told the strange story of man's nature — the con-, 
flict of its passions, the wild commingling of good and 
evil elements, their ceaseless agitation, and all that 
makes up the mystery of the human heart — the strange 
mystery that dwells in the breast of every human being. 

The influence of any department of poetry must be 
sought in that sphere of action and passion which is its 
archetype ; for all poetry, that is truly such, is the imagi- 
native representation of life. Now, tragic poetry has its 
original in the sorrows and misery that float like clouds 
over the days of human existence. Afilictions are ever 
travelling across the earth upon errands, mysterious, but 
merciful, could we only understand them ; and the poet, 
picturing them to us in some sad story of his own, teaches 
the imaginative lesson of their influence upon the heart. 
He shows what that heart is capable of; its often un- 
known power and energy and endurance; the passions 
that are slumbering there; the feelings which may be 
wrought either to a pitch of wickedness or to some lofty 
mood of heroic virtue. I say again, that to the poet, 
and chiefly to the tragic poet, belongs the function of 



KING LEAR. 349 



unravelling that greatest of all earthly mysteries — the 
human heart. And this is done for salutary uses; for 
be assured that mighty poets are inspired with the power 
of portraying the soul in its strength and its weakness, 
not for the effeminate purpose of mere sentiment, but 
that we may the better know our own natures — the better 
learn what the spirit which abides within us is capable 
of. Whether that teaching of the poet is made practi- 
cally influential upon character, or the impressions be 
suffered to pass away in sentimental inactivity, in viola- 
tion of that law of our moral being which tells us that 
feelings, no matter how virtuous, will surely perish unless 
they are converted into active principles, is another con- 
sideration to which I may revert hereafter. But the 
question now is as to the moral design of tragedy, not 
whether its uses are neglected. The great critic of anti- 
quity, with all the sublime solemnities of his country's 
dramatic literature in his thoughts, in the presence, as it 
were, of that spectral mystery of fate which overshadowed 
Athenian tragedy, has told us that — '^ Tragic poetry is 
the imitation of serious action, employing pity and terror 
for the purpose of chastening such passions.'^* A great 
modern poet tells us that — 

" It were a wantonness, and would demand 
Severe reproof, if we were men whose hearts 
Could hold vain dalliance with the misery 
Even of the dead : contented thence to draw 
A momentary pleasure, never mark'd 
By reason, barren of all future good. 
But we have known that there is often found 



* Aristotle's Treatise on Poetry, chap. vi. 



350 LECTURE FIRST. 



In mournful thoughts, and always might be found, 
A power to virtue friendly."* 

Now, it is my purpose to trace this ^^ power to virtue 
friendly'^ in tragic poetry, designed as it is to shadow 
forth imaginatively the mournful thoughts of our actual 
life, and to show that the poet gives us the best insight 
into our nature — teaching us, by his imaginative realities, 
how the heart may be hardened ; how it may be melted ; 
that thus we may the better know what should be our 
true dealings with the principles and passions of our 
fellow-beings and of ourselves. This is the profound and 
simple morality of that drama which is to be my illustra- 
tion this evening. 

But let me introduce the contemplation of that sub- 
lime production of art, the tragedy of King Lear, by first 
presenting a simpler example of pathetic poetry, to show 
" the power to virtue friendly" which abides in mournful 
thoughts. There is a tradition respecting one of the 
ancient ecclesiastical edifices in the North of England, 
that it was founded by the mandate of a mourning 
mother — the first impulse when her despairing, obdurate, 
and voiceless grief was turned into tranquil resignation 
for the fate of her only son, a gallant youth who perished 
pitiably in the rocky chasm of the river Wharf. The 
story and its moral are told in the unafi'ected stanzas 
of a ballad : 

"Young Romilly through Barden woods 
Is ranging high and low 
And holds a grayhound in a leash, 
To let slip upon buck or doe. 

* "Wordsworth's Excursion, b. i. "Works, p. 401. 



KING LEAR. 361 



The pair have reached that fearful chasm, 

How tempting to bestride ! 
For lordly Wharf is there pent in 

"With rocks on either side. 

This striding place is called the Strid, 

A name which it took of yore : 
A thousand years hath it borne that name, 

And shall a thousand more. 

And hither is young Romilly come, 

And what may now forbid 
That he, perhaps for the hundredth time, 

Shall bound across the Strid ? 

He sprang in glee, for what cared he 

That the river was strong, and the rocks were steep ? 
But the greyhound in the leash hung back, 

And check'd him in his leap. 

The boy is in the arms of Wharf, 

And strangled by a merciless force; 
For never more was young Romilly seen 

Till he rose a lifeless corse. 

Now there is stillness in the vale, 

And deep, unspeaking sorrow : 
Wharf shall be to pitying hearts 

A name more sad than Yarrow. 

If for a lover the lady wept, 

A solace she might borrow 
From death, and from the passion of death; — 

Old Wharf might heal her sorrow. 

She weeps not for the wedding-day 

Which was to be to-morrow : 
Her hope was a farther-looking hope, 

And her's is a mother's sorrow. 

He was a tree that stood alone. 

And proudly did its branches wave ; 



352 LECTURE FIRST. 

And the root of this delightful tree 
Was in her husband's grave ! 

Long, long in darkness did she sit, 
And her first words were, * Let there be 

In Bolton, on the Eield of Wharf, 
A stately Priory !' 

The stately priory was rear'd ; 

And Wharf, as he moved along, 
To matins join'd a mournful voice, 

Nor fail'd at even-song. 

And the lady pray'd in heaviness 

That look'd not for relief! 
But slowly did her succour come, 

And a patience to her grief. 

Oh ! there is never sorrow of heart 

That shall lack a timely end. 
If but to God we turn, and ask 

Of him to be our friend !"* 

I need not stop to show how, in this story, there came 
from mournful thoughts a power to virtue friendly. The 
science of ethics could not teach a more precious lesson 
than is conveyed by the reflection, that the darkness of a 
lonesome heart in which the mourner sat, caught its first 
ray of light by the resolve of an act of piety. It was 
thus the heavy cloud of hopeless sorrowing was scattered; 
it was thus that the widowed mother's spirit, while yet 
on earth, found a home in the calm and unclouded region 
of holy emotions, and her aspirations and the chaunted 
services of the church and the voice of the waters of the 
fatal river all blended together to consecrate the place. 

* Wordsworth's Force of Prayer. Works, p. 356. 



KING LEAR. 353 



From these simple verses let us now turn to learn how 
the same truth is conveyed in one of the most awe-inspi- 
ring productions of Shakspeare's genius — the tragedy of 
King Lear. Let us seek to discover the salutary influ- 
ences of that tumultuous and solemn agony with which it 
is filled, and thus verify the words of the great critic of 
antiquity, that ^' tragedy is meant to chasten the passions 
of the soul by the agency of terror and pity." These are 
the wise words of him whom Grreece, in the abundance 
of all that the intellect of man can achieve, gave as 
worthy to be the philosopher and critic of her poets, and 
who brought his art of criticism from a reverential gazing 
upon the pages of Homer, and reverential insight into 
the deep places of his own heart. Let me here ask 
whether the truth of this principle, which I am about to 
take as my guide through these lectures, is not recognised 
in its analogy to the outer world — whether there is not a 
violent, and it may be, a terrific, chastening of the elements 
without, like the painful purification of the moral elements 
within us. A heavy and pestilent atmosphere may be 
gathering around us, the seeds of disease and death float- 
ing upon it. Then there is a lurid threatening of the 
tempest — a hurried movement of the clouds; and the 
wind, which had been ominously moaning, comes rising 
up from beneath the horizon like the terrific phantom 
that haunted the palace of Dion — a sullen spectre — 

" Sweeping, vehemently sweeping, 
Like Auster, whirling to and fro 
His force in Caspian foam to try ; 
Or Boreas, when he scours the snow 
That skins the plains of Thessaly ;"* 

* "Wordsworth's Dion. Works, p. 359. 
23 



354 LECTURE FIRST. 



and when the tumult of the elements is over, there is a 
pure air to breathe ; and overhead is the blue sky, into 
whose infinite depth the eye cannot look without a sense 
of better things, than when it is ever bent downwards to 
what is low and corrupt — the measurable meannesses that 
entangle our footsteps. Now, akin to this is the strife of 
passions, which passes away and leaves in the soul a calm 
and a purity it knew not before. Or, again, the rain 
weeps upon the earth, and, ere the drops are dried — 
while glistening with the rays of the returning sun — the 
grass will begin its silent growth in the valley; and so it 
is that, by the virtue of pathetic influences, gentle emo- 
tions will spring up from the soil of a saddened spirit. 

The significancy of the very titles of Shakspeare's plays 
at once tells , us that the interest of ^^King Lear'^ is 
meant to centre chiefly about the aged monarch — an 
ancient British king. The "first step in the accurate 
study of any great dramatic poem is to consider the 
locality and the period, so far, at least, as they serve to 
cast their lights and shadows upon the characters. The 
idea of place is definite, strikingly so by virtue of such 
local description as of the Dover Cliff, impressing the 
imagination with the knowledge that Britain is the scene. 
This serves, too, to make it a home story; and such, in- 
deed, it was, when Shakspeare, not inventing the plot, 
simply took it as an old legend of the land, to be made 
forever a living thing by the life-blood infused into 
it by a poet's genius. While it is thus distinct as to 
place it is all shadowy as to time ; you must go back 
beyond the Norman Conquest, the Saxon, the Dane, or 
even the Eoman ; back into a region which the ray of 
historic light dimly penetrates, only to show in the misty 



K I N G L E A R. 355 



confusion the strange shapes of fable and romance. All 
that can be learnt is, that Lear and his daughters lived a 
long time ago ; and it only concerns us to observe that it 
was in some age earlier than the Christian era, when men 
fancied that their destinies were ruled by the stars, and 
put up their prayers to gods passionate like themselves. 
This is important ; for the wild and stormy tumult of the 
drama is more in unison with a period of paganism than 
it could be with any age of true faith. Lear is a barbaric 
chieftain — a heathen monarch; and the wilfulness of 
offence at an unoffending child, and the agonized impre- 
cations upon his wicked daughters, befit a heathen's lips. 
The lurid atmosphere of the tragedy could not have been 
harmonized with the radiance of Christendom ; and, 
therefore, the imagination is skilfully guided into a pagan 
land ; for it is in the very first scene that one mythologi- 
cal oath after another is uttered by the king, swearing by 
Apollo, Jupiter — 

"By the sacred radiance of the sun; 
The mysteries of Hecate and the night; 
By all the operations of the orbs 
From whom we do exist and cease to be." 

Except in these two respects — distance from the distinct- 
ness of historic time and from the calmness of a Christian 
age — it matters not how many centuries ago we fancy the 
story; indeed, it is better that a great work of imagina- 
tion should stand aloof from chronology. Like the rela- 
tion between parent and child, on which the tragedy 
rests, it is not circumscribed by time ; and, as long as 
there shall be parental feeling on the earth — as long as 
there shall be filial piety, there must be sympathy with 
the " child-changed father" in this wondrous poem. 



356 LECTURE FIRST. 



The first impression that is given of Lear's character is 
that of selfishness, arising from the habitual exercise of 
power. He is fourscore years old, and his heart has been 
hardened by that which is well-nigh sure to harden the 
heart of any man — the possession of irresponsible strength. 
His only law is his own absolute will, now feebly guided 
by an intellect which time has begun to work on : the 
gods are only ministers to his oaths and imprecations. 
He stands before us the very personation of unlimited 
despotism, lawless and selfish. He is surrounded by cour- 
tiers, but they are not counsellors. The only council- 
chamber is his own mind; and there he matures, in the 
lonely dignity of a tyrant's will, the " dark purpose" as 
he calls it, of his abdication and the division of his king- 
dom. In the very act of putting ofi" royalty, every word 
and motion of the aged man is kingly — the speech and 
action of one so long habituated to the use of arbitrary 
authority — so that when he purposes to lay it down, there 
is despotism in the very resignation. As if the issues of 
life were in his mortal hands, he decrees the course of his 
remaining days : 

"'Tis our fast intent 
To shake all cares and business from our age, 
Conferring them on younger strengths, while we 
Unburthen'd crawl toward death." 

This passage, it seems to me, suggests one of those dim 
presentiments which Shakspeare frequently employs, as 
darkly prophetic of the future in his dramas. We feel as 
if this absolute planning for the future, even for the rem- 
nant days of his old age, can hardly come to good. Hu- 
man power is reaching beyond its limits, and the pride of 
power, so confidently resolving upon freedom from all 



KING LEAR. 367 

cares, seems to shadow forth its own disappointment. 
The anxieties of not only sovereignty but of humanity are 
to be laid aside ; yet, at the very moment when, with 
kingly self-confidence, he is sending this decree forth that 
he will travel onward unburthened to the grave, we seem 
to have a mysterious forewarning — low words of admoni- 
tion — that burdens a thousand-fold weightier shall be 
heaped upon him. Troubles to come are casting their 
shadows before and darkening the splendour of his pride. 
We may fancy Lear, like another ancient barbaric king 
of Britain, intoxicated with the lifelong use of despotic 
power, giving his mandate to stay the flood of troubles ; 
and, at the same time, the approaching waters of the 
deep are curling their threatening surges not only to dash 
the spray upon his feet, but to heave huge billows upon 
his discrowned head. 

The more deeply we study the opening of this drama, 
the more perfect it is found as a personation of the in- 
tense selfishness of irresponsible power. The king sits 
solitary. Observe, there is no queen to share his throne 
and to approach him with a wife's counsel, and even the 
aJBTections of his children are objects of command. Every- 
thing is subordinate — every thing self-centering. The 
instant he finds his vanity frustrated in a pitiful scheme 
to extort professions of fondness from his daughters, the 
silence of his darling child becomes rebellion, and the 
counsel of a faithful and afi"ectionate subject, treason. 
The ruling passion is the pride of despotism, and the 
vengeance of insulted royalty is swift in an indiscriminate 
destruction. Now, this is very sad — that an old man's 
heart, a father's heart, should be so hard and so hollow 
that pride and passion are echoing there as the wind 



LECTURE FIRST. 



might througli the ruins of an ancient Druid temple on 
some barren British waste. To the eye of a pure moral 
intelligence, this should be a more deplorable spectacle 
than that piteous one of the aged king unhoused and 
unsheltered in the storm. Here it is the moral storm of 
his own lawless passions — of a vindictive selfishness and 
a despotic will making havoc in the heart. In the other 
it is only the thunder, the wind, and the rain — the outer 
elements beating upon the outei* man. 

Such is the character of King Lear when first made 
known to us : — self-willed, irritable, despotic, unnatural, 
rash in temper and weak in judgment — an object of 
aversion from the intensity of his cruel selfishness. And 
yet, beneath all this, there is something which shows 
that these are the ruins of a noble nature, overgrown, 
indeed, with all the weeds that rankly luxuriate in the 
habit of tyranny. The dutiful respect of his courtiers 
shows that genuine majesty had not wholly degenerated 
into despotism; and enough is told of what had gone 
before the opening scenes, to let us know that, in a heart 
so miserably perverted, there were some gracious affec- 
tions — the best of them for that faithful child whom he 
now casts away, " dowered with his curse and strangered 
with his oath.'^ Cordelia was the darling of the palace 
— far dearer to him than the hard-fronted Goneril and 
Regan. 

Now, how is this nature to be redeemed? How is 
human sympathy to be reanimated in a tyrant's heart ? 
What Promethean heat is there to rekindle extinct affec- 
tions ? How shall the barren soil of selfishness be broken 
up, so that virtuous and gentle emotions may grow there ? 
The mischief wrought by fourscore years of tyranny upon 



KING LEAR. 359 



the soul of him that used it, is to be done away. The 
tragedy teaches the restoration of Lear's moral nature. 
It is ajQfected in a twofold way — ^by all the agony that is 
crowded into the short and stormy twilight of his life, 
and by the gentle mediation of his injured daughter. 

It is this process I am anxious to trace, assuming a 
familiarity on the part of each one of my hearers with 
the course of this famous. tragedy. The tragic movement 
begins with the cruel disowning and banishment of Lear's 
true child, brought about by his disappointment in the 
miserable device to draw from each of his daughters 
wordy protestations of filial affection. The hollow hearts 
of Groneril and Regan are well fitted to utter sounds 
enough to fill the monarch's craving ears, and their flat- 
tery hurries him on in the uncalculating confidence of 
hearing the sweeter music of Cordelia's voice — for she 
was the dearest to him — the one of whom he soon after 
says, even in his angry disappointment — 

"I loved her most and thought to set my rest 
On her kind nursery." 

"We sympathize with the fond old man's amazement at 
her answer, and it is hard to suppress a little regret that 
she could not humour him and yet preserve her sincerity. 
It is a pity she is forced to speak as she does, and we are 
half tempted to join in the king's censure when he speaks 
of her ^' pride which she calls plainness.'^ But she could 
not answer otherwise. The truthfulness of her nature 
instinctively recoiled from the hypocrisy of her sisters to 
the opposite point of speechless affection. She had just 
heard language desecrated to the uses of heartless deceit, 
and the sanctity of her spirit could not suffer the unhal- 



360 LECTURE FIRST. 

lowed tiling to touch lier lips. More than this, the very 
form of the question forbade her to speak : 

" What can you say to draw 
A third more opulent than your sisters ?" 

as if the unpolluted temple of her heart was to be made 
a place of traffic — as if her dearest and dutiful affections 
could be bought and bribed and bargained with. Her 
love had ever been a freewill offering, at once a gift and 
a duty; and now the parent, in a mood of unthinking, 
selfish fondness, was seeking to turn it into something for 
which land and money should be equivalents — it was to 
be measured out in words and a price paid down for it. 
All that was left for Cordelia was silence, broken only by 
the firm reiteration of her simple, respectful answer. 
When Lear, before the tempest of his anger rises, with a 
slight admonition, solicits her to speak again, the full 
heart of his child gives utterance to a few words — few, 
but with infinitely more truth and love in them than in 
all the idle echoes that came sounding from the hollow 
caverns in the hearts of Goneril and Regan : 

" Unhappy that I am, I cannot heave 
My heart into my mouth. I love your majesty 
According to my bond — nor more, nor less." 

Cordelia's voice, we are told, '^ was ever soft, gentle, and 
low.'^ But it was unintelligible to a mind deluded by 
flattery; for, after a few questionings, somewhat in the 
way of remonstrance, the stormy will of a despotic king 
sweeps away the lingering affections of a father's heart. 
Cordelia's offence is against her sovereign as well as 
against her parent — treason as well as filial impiety. In 



KING LEAR. 361 

the brief space of a few moments, the turbulent old man 
casts off a child who never before had offended — the 
dearest of his daughters — the darling of the household : 

" Thy truth, then, be thy dower. 
For, by the sacred radiance of the sun, 
The mysteries of Hecate,and the night; 
By all the operations of the orbs. 
From whom we do exist and cease to be. 
Here I disclaim all my paternal care. 
Propinquity and property of blood. 
And, as a stranger to my heart and me, 
Hold thee, from this, forever. The barbarous Scythian 
Or he that makes his generation messes 
To gorge his appetite, shall to my bosom 
Be as well neighbour'd, pitied, and relieved, 
As thou, my sometime daughter." 

Who does not feel that the angry elements of this deplo- 
rable repudiation are passing harmlessly over Lear's inno- 
cent child and gathering into a black cloud to burst one day 
on his own head? With the rash confidence of unchas- 
tened power, the king is venturing to set his sovereignty 
against the mightier sovereignty of nature, and her laws 
will be avenged. We dread the consequences, not so 
much for Cordelia as for Lear himself. The fearless 
interposition of Kent is thrust aside, and the tragedy is 
begun. Naught can check it, for it is rising with the 
force and the speed of an ocean's tide upon the Solway 
sands. The monarch deigns to give a little, a very little, 
justification of the cruel disowning of his child : 

"I loved her most, and thought to set my rest 
On her kind nursery." 

But, on the instant, checking his words, as if it were an 



362 LECTURE FIRST. 

unkingly thing to explain or vindicate any act of his 
absolute sway^ lie commands his daughter to avoid his 

sight : 

" So be my grave my peace as here I give 
Her father's heart from her." 

Happy would it have been if the peace of the grave had 
been nearer at hand; for he little dreamed how much 
anguish lay in wait for him in the short way he had to 
travel from his throne to that resting-place. Every thing 
now savours of absolute dominion — irrational power own- 
ing no law but undisciplined will. It is piling up for a 
more fearful ruin. 

It somewhat relieves the pain with which we witness 
this arbitrary sovereignty wielded against the helpless 
daughter, to observe that^ when, in the full burst of his 
indignation, Lear casts her away, the bitter irony of the 
first words was, in reality, a benediction — the infatuated 
father's unintended blessing : 

" Thy truth, then, be thy dower.'' 

And so, indeed, it was — the dowerless daughter, richer 
and happier far than her majestic sisters; for Goneril 
and Eegan with all their territories, and the added por- 
tion of their plundered sister, with armies at their beck, 
and all the large efiects that troop with majesty, are in- 
carnations of guilty passions and self-tormenting cares. 
But we feel that the suffering Cordelia will return a 
ministering spirit. 

Lear has now accomplished both his deliberate and his 
sudden resolves : he has left his throne and he has driven 
away the daughter who offended him. It only remains 
for him to spend the remnant of his days without a care. 



KING LEAR. 363 

committing himself to tlie alternate guardianship of the 
two daughters who had promised so largely. He has 
quitted the palace, and is housed in the home of his 
eldest born. When he next appears, there is apparent 
a want of that majestic bearing which had heretofore 
given a dignity even to his angry and distempered 
moods ; there is an abrupt impatience, betraying a mind 
not wholly at ease — something of a desperate effort at 
joviality. The cares of the kingdom cast aside, he has 
been seeking to supply the void by the excitement of 
the chase, and, perhaps, to escape from bitter recollec- 
tions of his discarded child. On his return from hunt- 
ing, the first intimation is given that things are already 
beginning to go wrong. One of his followers suggests 
that there is an abatement of kindness in the conduct 
of his daughter. Lear himself, it appears, had felt it; 
he had been struggling against his own apprehensions 
— forced, it may be for the first time in all his life, to 
look for the fault in himself, and even hoping to find 
it there. The pride of the haughty king is beginning 
to break. This is the first symptom of that great moral 
change which is to come over him. The questioning 
of himself, the willingness to extenuate neglect, and to 
lay the blame there rather than upon his daughter, 
shows that he is standing on the threshold of that dark 
school of adversity in which his heart was to be both 
chastened and broken. His attendant has harped his 
fears aright: — "Thou but rememberest me of my own 
conception. I have perceived a most faint neglect of 
late, which I have rather blamed on mine own jealous 
curiosity than as a very pretence and purpose of unkind- 
ness. I will look further into it.'' 



364 LECTUREFIRST. 

The trutli is not long to be disguised^ for tlie shame- 
less tongue of Groneril herself announces it. Outraging 
all decency towards one who was beneath her roof in 
double trust — her father and her guest — she breaks out 
in invectives against his followers, mingled with com- 
plaints of him. He listens in a kind of dreamy bewil- 
derment — a confused questioning of his own identity and 
hers. He speaks only a few words, and she resumes her 
unnatural strain, assailing the virtue and honour of his 
chosen knights. Lear's royal spirit is roused again ; and 
his first indignant thought, with a fierce exclamation, is, 
to call his train together, and, on the instant, to quit his 
daughter's house. Yet, this burst of passion is difierent 
from that he poured upon Cordelia, for it is now tem- 
pered with sad reflections. Even in the midst of the 
present provocation, he is wrapt in self-communion. 
Bitter meditations are interrupted by broken words to 
Goneril and her imbecile husband, and passionate orders 
to prepare for departure. You can see, too, in what 
direction his half-uttered thouo-hts are travelling — to his 
own irretrievable rashness — "Age that too late repents;" 
and to his innocent child, whom he had injuriously 
driven from him — 

" ! most small fault, 
How ugly did'st thou in Cordelia show ! 
Which, like an engine, wrench'd my frame of nature 
From the fix'd place — drew from my heart all love 
And added to the gall." 

If his intellect should afterwards give way beneath the 
load of woes, he is now, at least, coming to his right 
hear* It is not only turning with forgiveness to his true 
daughter, but it is also solemnized with self-reproach. It 



KING LEAR. 365 

is this whicli seems to subdue his spirit to a reflective 
mood, lAusing at the very time the outrage is done 
to him : 

" Ingratitude ! thou marble-hearted fiend, 
More hideous when thou show'st thee in a child 
Than the sea monster." 

There is this subdued tone even in his awful prayer that 
nature would withhold from his offending daughter a 
mother's happiness in her offspring, that she may feel 

" How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is 
To have a thankless child." 

But- his mingled passion and remorse are overmastering 
him; for, after quitting the presence of Goneril, he 
rushes back again to give utterance to his overcharged 
heart by speaking his agony and his anger. His self- 
command is too weak, and his first relief is a burst of 
tears. What a strife of emotions is it when a father is 
forced to speak so to his daughter ! 

" Life and death ! I am ashamed 
That thou hast power to shake my manhood thus — 
That these hot tears, which break from me perforce, 
Should make thee worth them. Blasts and fogs upon thee ! 
The untented woundings of a father's curse 
Pierce every sense about thee. Old fond eyes, 
Beweep this cause again, I'll pluck you out 
And cast you with the waters that you lose 
To temper clay." 

The tragedy is now deepening and more hurried. 
Visions of resumed sovereignty — thoughts of taking it 
again by force — float before Lear's imagination ; and, at 



366 LECTURE FIRST. 

the departure from Groneril's castle, his broken sentences, 
convulsive laughter at the wild jests of his faithful fol- 
lower, the fool — threats — thoughts half-uttered — betray 
the tumultuous condition of his mind. Amono; these 
thoughts is one that shows the sharp moral discipline 
that is at work upon him — contrition for the wrong done 
to his true child, which had been growing in his heart, 
and now, for the first time, is partly spoken. It is to 
Cordelia alone the words can apply — ^' I did her wrong. ^^ 
He could not name her. 

Lear approaches the dwelling of his second daughter 
with misgivings of her fidelity. He struggles to suppress 
them, but they are there. The interview with Regan is 
a most painful one. In that with Goneril he had assumed 
the highest tone of his fresh and unchecked anger, and 
was ready to boast that he had another daughter to look 
to. But now after G-oneriFs defection, if Regan, too, 
prove false, his kingdom becomes desolate. Where can 
the old man find shelter for his discrowned head? He 
knows it is his last hope, and his tone is lowered. He 
strives to prevent this one's misconduct, and yet both his 
paternal affection and his royal pride recoil from what he 
feels to be a pitiable degradation — a white-haired father, 
who had given up all, bending a brow hallowed by eighty 
years, to beseech in return from a daughter no more than 
forbearance from cruel and unnatural treatment. There- 
fore his appeals to her are indirect. He replies to her 
formal words of welcome with terms of endearment ; he 
tells her of the enormity of Goneril' s ingratitude, and of 
his own wounded spirit; he tells her, too, of her own 
obligations, and the trust he has in her better nature, 
and he reminds her of her dead mother : 



KING LEAR. 367 

" Beloved Regan, 
Thy sister's naught. Oh, Regan, she hath tied 
Sharp-toothed unkindness,like a vulture, here! 
I can scarce speak to thee; thou'lt not believe 
Of how depraved a quality, Regan ! 

His emotions overpower his utterance — and what does 
this speechless agony avail him ? Only to bring down 
one of the worst blows that can be struck on the human 
heart — ^when wrongs are passionately complained of to 
one from whom a sympathy is rightfully due, to find 
them coldly palliated. Now, would you not have thought 
that this treatment must call forth another outbreak of 
parental indignation ? But no ! Lear's anger turns back 
only against the first ofi"ender with reiterated curses upon 
G^oneril. With Regan he still pleads indirectly by attri- 
buting to her a tender-hearted nature, by telling her there 
is comfort in her eyes and none of the burning fierceness 
that flamed upon him from Goneril's, and by reminding 
her of ^'the ofiices of nature'^ and "bond of childhood.'^ 
He is hoping against hope, and his last hope sickens unto 
death at the entrance of Goneril herself; for then there 
flashes upon his mind the horrid belief that his two 
daughters are confederated against him. Where now 
does the old man look for help ? For the first time, he 
looks away from earth. Heretofore his pride and his 
anger have looked up to heaven for the dread purpose 
of calling down imprecations. Now, his chastened spirit 
looks up in supplication. Nay, more, as he feels his 
earthly sympathies perishing around him, there is that 
sublime effort of imagination by which he identifies his 
own old age with' that of the heavens : 



368 LECTURE FIRST. 

" heavens ! 
If you do love old men, if your sweet sway 
Allow obedience, if yourselves are old, 
Make it your cause ; send down and take my part I" 

His spirit sank within him at tlie appearance of Goneril : 
a deadlier chill seizes upon it at a worse sight : 

" Regan ! wilt thou take her by the hand ?" 

Once his mind seems to be wandering after Cordelia 
when he speaks of his ^' dowerless youngest born 3^' but 
his remaining pride sweeps the thought away, and there 
follows that wretched scene in which the helpless old 
king is bandied by the arguments of his daughters threat- 
ening and reasoning about the reduction of his retinue. 
When Lear speaks in answer — it is a strange utterance — 
at first, as if he would fain let his thoughts stray from his 
present misery into a region of abstractions; or, more pro- 
bably, as if his mind were beginning to lose all law of its 
own, and were moved only by chance impulses, there is a 
train of mere speculative reasoning ; then a supplication 
to heaven on behalf of his acknowledged poverty and 
wretchedness, disturbed, however, by dark infidel doubts 
that the gods may be the evil destinies to destroy him ; 
then there is a desperate rallying of his mere human 
energy, fitfully broken with wild and royal threats, vague 
as the winds that are already heard preparing a rude 
reception for him on the heath : 

" Oh, reason not the need — our basest beggars 
Are in the poorest thing superfluous. 
Allow not nature more than nature needs, 
Man's life is cheap as beasts'. Thou art a lady: 
If only to go warm were gorgeous, 
Why, nature needs not wbai thou gorgeous wear'st. 



KING LEAR. 369 

Which scarcely keeps thee warm. But, for true need, — 

You heavens give me that patience, patience I need ! 

You see me here, you gods, a poor old man. 

As full of grief as age — wretched in both. 

If it be you that stir these daughters' hearts 

Against their father, fool me not so much 

To bear it tamely; touch me with noble anger. 

Oh, let not women's weapons, water-drops. 

Stain my man's cheeks ! — No, you unnatural hags, 

I will have such revenges on you both 

That all the world shall 1 will do such things, — 

What they are, yet I know not ; but they shall be 

The terrors of the earth. You think I'll weep ; 

No, I'll not weep. 

I have full cause of weeping, but this heart 

Shall break into a hundred thousand flaws. 

Or ere I'll weep. fool, I shall go mad !" 

Lear is now environed witli his thick-thronging afflic- 
tions, and the dark presentiment of insanity has entered 
his mind. The moral tempest has raged its utmost, and 
the tragic effort is fitly sustained when the aged sufferer, 
houseless and hopeless, is found wandering over the deso- 
late heath, exposed to the unsparing storm. At the very 
time that his intellect is becoming unsettled and there is 
the restlessness of a fevered brain, his thoughts discover 
a fitful and unwonted strength. Already he has sought 
to identify by a mighty grasp of the imagination his own 
old age with that of the heavens themselves, and now he 
feels in the beatings of the tempests the blows of his 
daughters : 

" I tax not you, you elements, with unkindness, 
I never gave you kingdom, called you children; 
But yet I call you servile ministers, 
That have with two pernicious daughters joined 
Your high engender'd battles 'gainst a head, 
So old and white as this." 
24 



370 LECTURE FIRST. 



But most impressive is it to trace the effect of this severe 
cliastemng upon the king's moral nature. His closest 
sympathy now is with that humble creature who had been 
in prosperous days the light-hearted and privileged jester 
at the royal table, but who clings so faithfully to his mas- 
ter's miseries. Lear's affection for his devoted favourite 
grows deeper and more sensitive : 

"Poor fool and knave, I have one part in my heart 
That's sorry yet for thee." 

His pity for the fooFs exposure to the storm and cold, 
shows a self-forgetfulness which is a new element in 
Lear's character. When brought to the wretched hovel 
for shelter, he is solicitous to provide first for the fool; 
and this sympathy expands with a more comprehensive 
one for all suffering humanity, accompanied with a self- 
reproach for having, in his palmy days, taken too little 
heed of houseless poverty 

" Poor, naked wretches, wheresoe'er you are 
That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm, 
How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides. 
Tour loop'd and window'd raggedness, defend you 
From seasons such as these ? Take physic, pomp, 
Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel, 
That thou may'st shake the superflux to them 
And show the heavens more just." 

Lear's destiny demands a yet lower humiliation. The 
entanglements of his brain are becoming more perplexed, 
and you can trace the footsteps of his departing reason. 
There is coming on, as has been finely said by Mr. Hal- 
lam, " that sublime madness, not absurdly sudden as in 
some tragedies, but in which the strings that keep his 



KING LEAR. 371 



reasoning powers together, give way, one after another, 
with the phrensy of rage and grief. Then it is that we 
find, what in life may sometimes be seen, the intellectual 
energies grow stronger in calamity, and especially under 
wrong. An awful eloquence belongs to unmerited suffer- 
ing. Thoughts burst out more profound than Lear in 
his prosperous hour could ever have conceived ; inconse- 
quent — for such is the condition of madness — ^but, in 
themselves, fragments of coherent truth, the reason of 
the unreasonable mind.'' 

It is when Lear is brought lowest that his good angel, 
the lost Cordelia, comes back to minister to him. We 
first hear of her in that exquisite description — one of the 
most graphic that Shakspeare ever drew — of her receiving 
the letters narrating her father's affliction : 

"She took them, read them in my presence; 
And now and then an ample tear trill'd down - 
Her delicate cheek; it seem'd she was a queen 
Over her passion ; who, most rebel-like, 
Sought to be king o'er her. 

Kent. 0, then it moved her? 

Gent. Not to a rage ; patience and sorrow strove 
"Who should express her goodliest. You have seen 
Sunshine and rain at once ; her smiles and tears 
"Were like a better day. Those happy smiles 
That play'd on her ripe lip, seem'd not to know 
What guests were in her eyes ; which parted thence, 
As pearls from diamonds dropp'd. In brief, sorrow 
Would be a rarity most beloved, if all 
Could so become it. 

Kent. Made she no verbal question ? 

Gent. Faith, once or twice, she heaved the name of father 
Pantingly forth, as if it pressed her heart; 
Cried, ' Sisters ! sisters ! — Shame of ladies ! sisters ! 
Kent! father! sisters! What? i' the storm? i' the night? 
Let pity not be believed !' — There she shook 



372 LECTURE FIRST. 



The holy water from her heavenly eyes, 

And clamour moisten'd : then away she started, 

To deal with grief alone." 

The turbulence of the tragedy now gives place to gen- 
tler emotions. After a tempest so ruinous, there break 
forth some rays of the pathetic light of sunset. A softer 
radiance is floating round Cordelia. 

But Lear must not pass away from life in the darkness 
of insanity. The restoration of his mind is as inimitable 
as its aberration. When he awakes from his sleep of mad- 
ness he is all gentleness — regenerate by the discipline of 
adversity and of his phrensy. One of the most beautiful 
dramatic passages ever composed is that where Cordelia 
is watching over her sleeping father — praying over him — 

" you kind gods, 
Cure this great breach in his abused nature. 
The untuned and jarring senses, 0, wind up 
Of this child-changed father." 

The voice that, in happy days gone by, used to be music 
in his ears, is heard once more; and it is no wonder that, 
in his waking bewilderment, Lear answers her question 
whether he knows her — 

"You are a spirit, I know. "\Yhen did you die ?" 

The shrill accents of Groneril and Regan had been the 
horrid sounds he listened to, and then the stormy noises 
of an angry sky; but now the melody of Cordelia's voice 
carries him into the world of spirits. When his daughter 
beseeches his blessing, his confused recollections begin to 
shape themselves : 

" Pray, do not mock me : 
I am a very foolish, fond old man. 



KING LEAR. 373 

Fourscore and upward ; and, to deal plainly, 
I fear I am not in my perfect mind. 
Methinks I should know you, and know this man ; 
Yet I am doubtful; for I am mainly ignorant 
What place this is ; and aU the skill I have, 
Remembers not these garments ; nor I know not 
Where I did lodge last night : Do not laugh at me ; 
For, as I am a man, I think this lady 
To be my chUd, Cordelia." 

That despotic parental fondness wliicTi was only tributary 
to his pride and selfishness is purified, and now Lear 
looks upon his daughter with a true affection — that happy 
consciousness so feelingly expressed by the great poet of 
our times — the consciousness that — 

" There are spun 
Around the heart such tender ties 
That our own children to our eyes 
Are dearer than the sun."* 

The happy hours of this recognition are only short mo- 
ments in the tragedy. The gloom quickly gathers over 
it. The destiny of the drama demands its tragic ending; 
something diff'erent from a continuance of life with all the 
ills it is exposed to. There must be no tampering with 
the solemnities of its close. ^' Fourscore and upward" — 
why should Lear linger any longer on the earth ? Who 

" Would upon the rack of this tough world 
Stretch him out longer?" 

And Cordelia — the earth was too stormy and too wicked 
a place for one so pure and gentle to dwell upon. Be- 
sides, the law of a tragedy so lofty as this — so sublime 

* Wordsworth's Ruth. Works, p. 139. 



374 LECTURE FIRST. 



and solemn in its morality — required ttat she should be 
not only ministrant to her erring father, hut a propitiatory 
sacrifice. Her last duty was to him ; and the pity of it 
is, that the poor heart-broken old man could not have 
been spared that last agony of carrying in his arms his 
dead daughter. 

But compare Lear at the beginning of the drama — sel- 
fish, irritable, foolish, petulant, despotic, and unnatural — 
with Lear at the close of it. The chastened spirit — the 
gentleness of his heart-breaking as he drooped to death 
over the dead body of his darling Cordelia, and surely we 
are taught that — " There is in mournful thoughts a power 
to virtue friendly.^' 



LECTURE II * 

When I last had the pleasure of meeting you, we were 
engaged in the consideration of a tragedy in which the 
chief agency employed was the emotion of pity. It was 
surely most piteous to contemplate, first, the perversion 
of Learns moral nature, and then the accumulation of his 
agonies; and most piteous of all was it to contemplate the 
sad sacrifice of the innocent Cordelia. Yet, all this was 
accompanied with a reconciling principle, found in the 
reflection that the painful series of afflictions was a pro- 
cess of moral purification. Lear's heart was restored, and 
Cordelia's filial piety became more beautiful with the 
glory of martyrdom. 

The tragedy of Macbeth is, in these respects, very dif- 
ferent. The chastening of the passions, which tragedy is 
designed to accomplish, is now to be effected by the in- 
strumentality, not of pity, but of terror — terror in the 
imaginative presence of wicked temptations and of a fear- 
ful career of guilt. In the last lecture, I sought to show 
you how Shakspeare carried Lear along his stormy pil- 



« December 13th, 1842. 

375 



376 LECTURE SECOND. 



grimage onward to a better nature ] but now we aio to 
trace the downward course of a buman soul tbat has 
given itself over to the guidance of the spirits of dark- 
ness. It is a dramatic story of a temptation followed by 
guilt, and guilt followed by moral ruin. Nor is it only 
by showing the awful hauntings of a blood-stained con- 
science that the emotion of terror is to be awakened. In 
Lear the tragedy was moved by natural, human influ- 
ences — the passions of mortal beings only; but in Mac- 
beth other agencies are invoked — the power of witchcraft 
and all the visionary things that superstition deals with. 
There is a world of nature and a world above and beyond 
it ] and now both are to be brought together, which can 
be well accomplished only by a mighty effort of imagina- 
tion. The natural and the supernatural are to be blended 
— familiar beings and mysterious are to be associated, as 
it were, in one living company — things sensible and 
things fantastic. Without any feeling of incongruity, we 
are to be made to witness the firm tread of the armed sol- 
dier, and the noiseless gliding of ghosts, and the wild mo- 
tions of witches, flitting and hovering through the air. 

To have a just knowledge of the tragedy of Macbeth, 
we must form a distinct conception of the supernatural 
atmosphere which envelops the action. The air is lurid 
and thick with strange and awful creations. Distinct as 
are all its human interests, the tragedy is set in a sha- 
dowy, spectral region of witches — the mysteries of Hecate 
— ominous dreams and gloomy presentiments — of visions 
to the open eye of the wakeful guilty, and to the sealed 
eye of the sleeping — of invisible and mysteiious powers 
in the elements, and of the* prophetic sight of distant 
dynasties of kings — of incantations and of voiceless 



MACBETH. 377 



ghosts rising from fresh graves — ^blood-boltered visitants 
from charnel-houses. 

Those who have studied the genius of Shakspeare as 
an artistj are familiar with the significancy of the opening 
scenes in his dramas — I mean as indicating the general 
character of the whole play. This is peculiarly manifest 
in the tragedy of Macbeth. It is scarcely possible to 
conceive a shorter scene . than the first. It contains no 
more than twelve lines — short and broken — and yet it 
discloses the supernatural character of the drama^ and 
mysteriously indicates upon whom the powers of darkness 
are about to employ themselves. This brief scene, which 
stamps the nature of the play, so far transcends the power 
of scenic exhibition, that it must be removed from all 
injurious and low attempts to present it on the stage. It 
is addressed to the imagination and not to the senses. It 
cannot be looked at and listened to by the eye and the 
ear. The scene is a wild and instant appeal to one faculty 
of the mind, especially by the absence of all description. 
It is no more than an '' open place" — the persons, three 
witches. No one is looking on to describe them to us, or 
to express the emotions their presence might create. 
They are alone, and the only circumstances are '^ thunder 
and lightning.'^ No human sight is upon them in their 
solitude — no human sound is mingling with their speech. 
It is the dark communion of witches — one speaking to 
the other, and the only sound that is echoing to their in- 
tonations is the thunder, bursting close around them and 
then passing away in distant reverberations. The only 
light that falls upon their wild and unearthly forms is the 
lightning as it flashes from the clouds they are wrapt in. 
The turmoil and carna2:e of war are near at hand, and the 



378 LECTURE SECOND. 



three witches — kinless — nameless — sexless, too, I may 
say — the weird women with beards scenting the blood of 
a battle-field — meet to meet again to seal the deep damna- 
tion of their victim. Their fatal intent thus darkly inti- 
mated, they answer to mysterious calls of you know not 
what ^' Paddock'^ and ^' Grcymelkin/' some of the horrid 
animals which seem associated with the witches to mark 
their grossly earthy nature ; and, ere their presence has 
been well conceived, they vanish with wild utterance from 
them all of the moral confusion and murkiness of a 
demon's heart : 

" Fair is foul and foul is fair : 
Hover through the fog and filthy air." 

In this first short scene of witchcraft, no more than the 
name of Macbeth is introduced; but, in another scene, 
he is soon made known to us a soldier, and an adventu- 
rous and valiant one. His intrepidity in battle is point- 
edly presented in the glowing descriptions of those who 
had just witnessed some of his exploits — ^first one who 
had seen him fighting hand to hand a fierce and danger- 
ous rebel against the Scottish king — then one who had 
seen him breaking through the stout Norweyan ranks. 
^' His praises in the kingdom's great defence," are on the 
lips of all. He is the brave Macbeth — the noble Mac- 
beth — valour's minion — Bellona's bridegroom — the eagle 
— the lion in the hour of battle. In setting forth courage 
as a prominent trait in his character, there is an import- 
ant purpose which becomes manifest in the contrast with 
the change his character undergoes. Amid images of 
death on the field of battle he is undismayed ; and the 
narratives of his companions-in-arms proclaim his exploits 



MACBETH. 379 



of heroic daring. As the interest of the tragedy centres 
chiefly around the transformation of Macbeth's nature, 
we should carefully gather all the elements of it which 
are communicated in the opening scenes. He is a brave 
soldier, to whom fear is a stranger ; and he is dear to his 
sovereign, not only for his victories, but as a loyal and 
dutiful subject. This is all that we are told of him, and 
yet it raises expectations of other and still nobler traits of 
character ; for it has been finely said that — " The field of 
battle has been the field on which, more almost than on 
any other, has been manifested the spirit of self-sacrifice 
and self-devotion. And that war is practically a disci- 
pline of self-sacrifice, as well as of self-control, we perpe- 
tually see in domestic life; in which hardly any class 
of men show so much gentleness, so much forbearance, 
are so regardless of themselves, and so considerate towards 
others, as those whose hearts have glowed when the 
trumpet was calling them to battle.''* 



*■ I have not been able to verify this quotation, though it sounds 
very much like Archdeacon Hare ; and in his favourite De Maistre is 
to be found a kindred sentiment in eulogy of military character : 

" Le m6tier de la guerre . . . ne tend nullement a degrader, 
S. rcndre feroce ou dur, au moins celui qui I'exerce: au contraire, il 
tend a le perfectionner. L'homme le plus honnete est ordinairemen<- 
le militairo honnete, et, pour mon compte, j'ai toujours fait un ca? 

particulier . . . du bon sens militaire Dans le 

commerce ordinaire de la vie, les militaircs sont plus aimablos, plus 
faciles, et souvent meme, a ce qu'il m'a paru, plus obligeants que les 

autres hommes La religion chez eux se marie a 

I'honneur d'une maniere remarquable. ... La vertu, la piete 
meme s'allient tres-bien avoc le courage militairo ; loin d'aflfaiblir le 
guerrier, elles I'exaltent." Soirees de St. Petersbourg, vol. ii. p. 18 

W. B. R. 



LECTURE SECOND. 



But the trials to whicli Macbetli lias been exposed 
have been physical rather than moral dangers ; they give 
no absolute assurance that the trait of character which is 
proclaimed is any thing more than mere animal courage 
— a quality common to brutes and to men. Or it may be 
that courage which is generated in the opinion of 'the 
world — a sense of honour. Or, again, he may belong to 
that common class of characters — men whose course of 
life is well enough just as long as their impulses chance 
to be good — just as long as no violent temptation stands 
in their path; generous when generosity demands no 
self-sacrifice; dutiful when duty is easy and needs no 
self-denial, and charitable to error because indifferent to 
truth. The temptations to which humanity is exposed 
make it necessary to find a better armour than such 
negative virtue; and the hero of this tragedy, if only 
thus armed, will vainly cope with the spiritual powers 
that are about to wrestle with him. 

Before Macbeth appears, we have a further insight into 
the character of the supernatural beings who are to sway 
his destiny. The appointed time for their meeting with 
him is at hand ; the thunder of the past storm on that 
day, which had been "so fair and foul,'' was yet sounding 
over the heath, when the witches again meet, hastening 
together from witchcraft mischief and actually rising to 
something of sisterly sympathy, as they tell each other 
their exploits. TThen you consider the work they have 
on hand, the sublimity of the harm they are now plan- 
ning — nothing less than to drag down the soul of a 
brave and illustrious soldier to perdition — and then listen 
to the low and gross and comparatively vulgar witch- 
craft they aie exulting over, it is seen what extraordinary, 



MACBETH. 381 



anomalous creations these foul beings are. One of them 
had been busy "killing swine /^ another had been squab- 
bling with a sailor's wife, who refused the witch any of 
the nuts she was munching. This is surely the lowest 
caste of witchcraft, but straightway the hag rises from it 
to the terrific sublimity of a supernatural avenger — a fury 
of the classic drama. The woman's husband is "a sailor 
to Aleppo gone;" and upon him the witch, summoning 
the adverse winds of the sea, threatens to wreak her 



" Sleep shall, neither night nor day, 
Hang upon his pent-house Ud; 
He shall live a man forbid ; 
Weary seven nights nine times nine, 
Shall he dwindle, peak and pine ; 
Though his bark cannot be lost. 
Yet it shall be tempest-tost." 

The boast of her threatened vengeance is confirmed by 
the sudden recollection of a trophy gained on some former 
occasion of mischief on the ocean — "A pilot's thumb, 
wrecked as homeward he did come.'' The witches are, 
indeed, "posters of the sea and land" — vagrant beggars 
— secret destroyers of the farmer's live-stock — indwel- 
lers in the storm of thunder and lightning, with winds 
and tempests at their command ; but what, amid all that 
is low and grovelling, gives them a strange and terrific 
sublimity, they are tempters of the conscience. While 
gloating over the pilot's thumb, they are startled at the 
sound which signals the approach of Macbeth* and his 
Scottish soldiers. Quickly winding up a charm, and 
catching somewhat of a solemn demeanour from the 
magnitude of their malice, they rise suddenly to the 



LECTURE SECOND. 



full stature of their supernatural strength, and on the 
blasted heath prepare to proclaim their prophetic salu- 
tations. The very first moment Macbeth makes his 
appearance, the wicked eye is upon him. He has hardly 
spoken a word to his fellow-soldier Banquo, before it is 
perceived that their path is stopped by these uncouth 
appearances. Banquo is the first to speak and to chal- 
lenge them : 

" What are these, 
So withered and so wild in their attire ? 
They look not like the inhabitants o'the earth, 
And yet are on't. Live you ? or are you aught, 
That man may question ? You seem to understand me, 
By each at once her choppy finger laying 
Upon her skinny lips : you should be women. 
And yet your beards forbid me to interpret 
That you are so." 

They answer not at Banquo's bidding; but when Mac- 
beth calls on them to speak, demands — "What are you?'' 
at that summons they are quick to answer in the three- 
fold acclaim spoken by one after another — 

"All hail, Macbeth! hail to thee, thane of Glamis. 
All hail, Macbeth ! hail to thee, thane of Cawdor. 
All hail, Macbeth ! thou shalt be king hereafter." 

It is a prophecy — the prophecy is a promise — and the 
promise is a temptation. From that instant he surren- 
ders himself to a wicked destiny : he is under a fascina- 
tion he never breaks through till the last hopeless hour 
of his life. Macbeth' s character is further shown by a 
most instructive contrast with the difi'erent mood of 
Banquo's mind; who, though not listless to the fortune- 
telling, preserves his self-possession and self-reliance, his 



MACBETH. 383 

open and purer nature not being tempted into commu- 
nion, as it were, with the mysterious interruptions. The 
integrity of his spirit is in his words : 

" r the name of truth, 
Are ye fantastical, or that indeed 
Which outwardly ye show ? My noble partner 
Ye greet with present grace, and great prediction 
Of noble having, and of royal hope, 
That he seems rapt withal ; to me you speak not : 
If you can look into the seeds of time, 
And say which grain will grow, and which will not, 
Speak then to me, who neither beg, nor fear. 
Your favours nor your hate." 

Every thing shows how deep the words of the witches 
have sunk into the heart of Macbeth. The quiet, martial 
composure of the soldier was greatly disturbed at the first 
announcement of the prophecy ; for it is then that Ban- 
quo says — 

" Good sir, why do you start; and seem to fear 
Things that do sound so fair ?" 

The commotion of his spirit is shown still more by the 
impetuous earnestness with which he questions them for 
further information : 

" Stay, you imperfect speakers, tell me more : 
By Sinel's death, I know, I am thane of Glamis 
But how of Cawdor ? — the thane of Cawdor lives, 
A prosperous gentleman ; and to be king 
Stands not within the prospect of belief, 
No more than to be Cawdor. Say, from whence 
You owe this strange intelligence ? or why 
Upon this blasted heath you stop our way 
With such prophetic greeting ? — Speak, I charge you." 



384 L E C T U R E S E C N D. 



When the witches vanish into the air — what seemed cor- 
poreal melting into the wind — his first feeling is, ''Would 
they had stayed V Banquo thinks of them as ''bubbles 
of the earth/ ^ and questions the reality of what had just 
transpired. But Macbeth, as if seeking encouragement 
for his thoughts, clinging to the prophecy, repeats what 
they had promised — "Your children shall be kings;" 
and thus secures the satisfaction of hearing from human 
lips the promise to himself, for his companion naturally 
replies — "You shall be king.'^ Then, as if conscious 
already of thoughts that could not be looked into, Mac- 
beth turns from the higher to the lower promise : 

" And thane of Cawdor too ; went it not so ?" 

On the spot he is soon hailed by the messenger from 
the king with the new title of Cawdor, the forfeited rank 
and estate of the rebel thane. This speedy verification 
of the words of witchcraft greatly deepens the impression 
on the mind of Macbeth; and, while he is wrapped in 
meditation, the supernatural influence is driving his 
thoughts onward to the future — 

" Glamis and thane of Cawdor : 
The greatest is behind.-' 

Again he turns to Banquo to draw from him other sanc- 
tion than what his own spirit gave to his yet obscure 
ambition : 

"Do you not hope your children shall be kings, 
When those that gave the thane of Cawdor to me, 
Promised no less to them?" 

But the purer nature of Banquo is already recoiling from 
the supernatural powei-s that have crossed their path ; 



MACBETH. 385 



" That, trusted home, 
Might yet enkindle you into the crown. 
Besides the thane of Cawdor. But 'tis strange : 
And oftentimes, to win us to our harm, 
The instruments of darkness tell us truths ; 
Win us with honest trifles, to betray us 
In deepest consequence.'' 

Banquo instinctively feels that tlie promises, glorious as 
they are, come from powers of evil. His first exclama- 
tion, on finding them partly realized, was — 

" What can the devil speak true ?" 

The warning words he addresses to Macbeth are illustra- 
tive of Shakspeare's manner of foreshadowing the course 
of things in his drama, either by admonitions, or misgiv- 
ings, or presentiments of some kind, which he dispenses 
as preparations for the future. The warning is wasted on 
Macbeth. In fact, his career of guilt is begun. He is 
now not only rapt in solitary musing, but the great temp- 
tation is beginning to shape itself into a more definite 
form. The witches have cast a wicked light upon the 
crown on Duncan's brow, and it is reflected into the soul 
of Macbeth to dazzle and to lead him on to his own de- 
struction. His confidence in the event is growing; but 
his mind, quickened by the agencies that have touched 
it, is beginning to invent means for the accomplishment 
of his destiny, and these means, directed to an end thus 
prompted, are sure to be guilty ones. Indeed, his imagi- 
nation, in its morbid activity, has already grasped at its 
worst wickedness. The fancy of murder is the first 
symptom of the corruption of his conscience, and another 
sign — a most dangerous one in the career of iniquity — he 
is beginning to reason about his emotions : 



LECTURE SECOND. 



" Two truths are told, 
As happy prologues to the swelling act 
Of the imperial theme. * * * 
This supernatural soliciting 
Cannot be ill ; — cannot be good. — If ill, 
Why hath it given me earnest of success^ 
Commencing in a truth ? I am thane of Cawdor : 
If good, why do I yield to that suggestion. 
Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair. 
And make my seated heart knock at my ribs 
Against the use of nature ? Present fears 
Are less than horrible imaginings : 
My thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical, 
Shakes so my single state of man, that function 
Is smothered in surmise ; and nothing is 
But what is not." 

Macbeth has begun to dally in his mind with concep- 
tions of wicked depds, not without some convulsion of his 
better nature, which serves to sustain our sympathy with 
him. But, in all this process of temptation, amid his 
impulses and misgivings and agitations, observe there is 
no fixed principle of virtue in his character. A sense of 
mere honour may have kept his course of life, thus far, 
free from reproach ; but, doubtless, it is an unsteady and 
undisciplined conscience which gives to evil suggestions 
so ready an admittance. He rallies from his agitation, 
not into the composure which would have been gained by 
a dismissal from his thoughts of the promises of witch- 
craft, but by a self-abandonment to his destiny : 

" If chance will have me king, why chance may crown me, 
Without my stir." 

He clings to the temptation, but seeks to commit himself 

to the uncontrollable tide of fate : 

" Come what come may ; 
Time and the hour runs through the roughest day." 



MACBETH. 387 

This is the only time the thought enters into the mind 
of Macbeth^ of trusting exclusively to the power of des- 
tiny without co-operation on his own part ; and it has fur- 
nished a striking illustration of the important principle in 
human nature, that faith, instead of leading, as has often 
been theoretically supposed, to diminish exertion, excites, 
on the contrary, to unwearied efforts. Prompted as Mac- 
beth is, to the possession of the crown by the prediction 
of the witches, we might have supposed that he would 
be withheld from the perpetration of crime by the con- 
sideration that it must be needless, since it was fated that 
he must be king. Once, and only once, does such a 
thought occur to him ; and thus has Shakspeare's know- 
ledge of human nature shown that faith — a real faith 
— whether good or evil, is a principle that leads to 
action. 

This feeble effort of Macbeth's to save his innocence 
by giving up to destiny his own free agency, is unavail- 
ing; for guilty imaginings — thoughts of murder — have 
begun to vitiate his spirit. Already there is something 
of the alarm of a conscience fearful that its own wicked 
musings are betrayed, and he begins to dissemble and 
prevaricate. He says to Banquo — 

" My dull brain was wrought with things forgotten," 

and proposes to his companion-in-arms candid communion 
respecting their mysterious adventure. While Banquo 
keeps his integrity, Macbeth is losing his sense of right 
and wrong : the poison of a supernatural evil influence is 
sinking down into his heart, and there is coming forth 
from the moral murkiness and confusion which begin to 



LECTURE SECOND. 



prevail there, an echo to the cry heard from the witches 
at their first appearance : 

" Fair is foul and foul is fair." 

It is hardly possible to conceive any thing more wild 
and fantastic and anomalous than the supernatural agen- 
cies which have so worked upon the guilty ambition of 
Macbeth ; and it is, therefore, most remarkable that there 
should be such an air of truthfulness about them. They 
seem to be, not the phantoms of a gross and absurd super- 
stition, but credible realities, so naturally do they coexist 
with human passions. This can be explained only by 
their being typical of something real. Few of us, I pre- 
sume, are unwilling to believe that there is around us an 
invisible world, not the less real because we cannot per- 
ceive it ; and I know of no reason why we may not also 
'>elieve, that that unseen world has its beings, who are 
mysteriously ministrant to either the good or the evil of 
men's lives.* It is no figurative language when we are 

* In Chorley's Memorials of Mrs. Hemans, vol. ii. p. 126, she writes 
from Rydal Mount : — " Have I ever told you how much Mr. Words- 
w^orth's reading and recitation have delighted me ? His voice has 
something quite breezelike in the soft gradations of its swells and 
falls. How I wish you could have heard it a few evenings since ! We 
had just returned from riding through the deep valley of Grasmere, 
and were talking of different natural sounds which, in the stillness of 
the evening, had struck my imagination. 'Perhaps,' I said, 'there 
may be still deeper and richer music pervading all nature than any 
which we are permitted to hear.' He answered by reciting those glo- 
rious lines of Milton's : 

' Millions of spiritual creatures walk the earth 

Unseen, both when we wake and when we sleep. 

All these with ceaseless praise his works behold 



MACBETH. 389 

taught that powers of darkness are ceaselessly roaming 
about to tempt the souls of men ; and it is only because 
our intellects are so materialized, that we are slow to be- 
lieve what rests upon other proof than the evidence of the 
senses. The spiritual world is as real or rather more real 
than the material; and, although we are not yet endowed 
with faculties to apprehend it, yet, with all its mysteries, 
it may be close to us and around us. Now, it is one of 
the functions of the imagination, as Shakspeare himself 
tells us, " to body forth the forms of things unknown,'^ 
and " turn them to shapes '/' and thus the weird sisters 
may be regarded as incarnations, not merely of evil sug- 
gestions, but of the invisible tempters of mankind — the 
spiritual enemies, to whose arts humanity is exposed. 
The tragedy, therefore, is at once an imaginative and 
most real representation of the career of human frailty 
yielding to temptation. 

The first interview between Duncan and Macbeth shows 
the progress of the guilty purpose — for the gentle pre- 

Both day and night : how often from the steep 
Of echoing hill or thicket have we heard 
Celestial voices to the midnight air 
Sole, or responsive each to other's note, 
Singing their great Creator? oft in bands 
While they keep watch, or nightly rounding walk 
With heavenly touch of instrumental sounds 
In full harmonic number joined, their songs 
Divide the night, and lift our thoughts to heaven.' 

And his tones of solemn earnestness, sinking, almost dying away into 
a murmur of veneration, as if the passage were breathed forth from 
the heart, I shall never forget; 'the forest leaves seemed stirred with 
prayer' while those high thoughts were uttered." W. B. R. 



Lr.CTURT-] srco>;D. 



sence of the monarch, his confiding kindness^ serve only 
to provoke a more distinct shaping of the "black and 
deep desires" which Macbeth is revolving in his mind. 
Thus far his guilt has been instigated only by the witch- 
craft-temptation, and known only in self-communion. He 
has been dealing alone with his ambition and his con- 
science. A new and irresistible power is superadded in 
the promptings of his wife. The temptation, begun by 
supernatural utterance, needs now only a wicked human 
voice to bring it to the consummation. 

The character of Lady Macbeth is one of the boldest of 
Shakspeare's conceptions; but it can here be considered 
only in its relation to her husband and his guilt. They 
closely resemble each other in the absence of moral prin- 
ciple, but they differ greatly in this — that she displays a 
fearful energy of will, a dauntlessness of purpose that is 
not swayed by any outward or inward influence ; while in 
Macbeth' s character, one large element is the philosophic 
element — the tendency to reflection. It is this musing, 
meditative habit of mind, and a susceptibility of imagina- 
tion, which contribute greatly to sustain a sympathy for 
the character, even after he is involved in criminality. 
It is hard to help lamenting the ruin of a capacious soul 
— one whose powers fitted it for better communion than 
with the dark portion of the spiritual world. 

Besides, Lady Macbeth, dwelling in her lonely castle- 
life, does not, like her husband, feel the secondary mo- 
tives — the sense of honour, the love of reputation, which 
are his chief moral principles. She is introduced in the 
high-wrought fervour excited by her husband's letter, in- 
forming her of the prophetic salutation of the witches, 
and the quick fulfilment of it in part. His confidence in 



MACBETH. 391 



tte promises is manifest ; and thus tlie temptation passes 
on from his heart to hers to kindle there the transport of 
ambition — the rapturous anticipation of royalty. She 
sees no obstacle^ but what she. contemptuously calls the 
^^milk of human kindness'^ in her husband's nature^ and 
she knows the influence of her own energetic will over his 
reflective spirit. It is the pride of power, therefore, as 
well as the lust of ambition, by which she is agitated : 

" Hie thee hither, 
That I may pour my spirits in thine ear ; 
And chastise with the valour of my tongue 
All that impedes thee from the golden round. 
Which fate and metaphysical aid doth seem 
To have thee crowned withal." 

One thought occupies her mind; one passion fills her 
heart ; and, impelled by supernatural force, it drives her 
across the bounds of woman's nature. Her fierce excite- 
ment becomes more highly wrought by the intelligence 
of the king's approaching visit, the dread issue of which 
is already grasped by her quickened thought : 

"The raven himself is hoarse, 
That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan 
Under my battlements." 

Divesting herself of womanly emotions, she calls on the 
powers of darkness — spirits that attend on schemes of 
murder — to ^"stop up the access and passage to remorse,^' 
and quell all ^^ compunctious visitings of nature," that 
she may the better scatter the scruples from her hus- 
band's conscience. In the midst of this phrensy of a 
lawless ambition, Macbeth appears, and nothing can be 
more rapid or decided than her dealing with him. She 



LECTURE SECOND. 



meets him witli no expression of conjugal affection, no 
tenderness at his return from the wars, but greets him 
with his titles, his honours present and promised : 

" Great Glamis, worthy Cawdor ! 
Greater than both, by the all-hail hereafter ! 
Thy letters have transported me beyond 
This ignorant present; and I feel now 
The future in the instant." 

In all Macheth's intercourse with his wife, there is a 
certain manliness of affection which contributes in some 
measure to redeem his character, and sustains a sympathy 
with him. His manner is distinguished by something of 
the deferential esteem of chivalry; and, after having seen 
him entertaining guilty imaginings and dallying with 
thoughts of murder, we seem to hear the voice of a 
better nature when, using words that might have been 
most innocent, he says : 

" My dearest lore, 
Duncan comes here to-night." 

Thoughts that he had indulged in solitary meditation he 
withholds from her; but a single question and a single 
answer betrays the sympathy of their wicked conceptions : 

Lady Ilacheth. And when goes hence ? 
Macbeth. To-morrow as he purposes. 

The hesitation is that of a wavering conscience. She 
knows it from familiarity with his temperament and from 
the perplexity of his countenance ; and she knows it can 
be swept away by her stronger will looking through all 
doubts and scruples and fears, to the object which filled 
her vision : 



MACBETH. 393 

" Oh never 
Shall sun that morrow see ! 
Your face, my thane, is as a book, where men 
May read strange matters. — To beguile the time, 
Look like the time ; — bear welcome in your eye, 
Your hand, your tongue : — look like the innocent flower, 
But be the serpent under it. He that's coming 
Must be provided for : and you shall put 
This night's great business into my despatch ; 
Which shall to all our nights and days to come 
Give solely sovereign sway and masterdom." 

His feeble answer — 

" We will speak further" — 

stows Mm not quite prepared ; but it is a signal not so 
mucb of indecision as tbe vanishing of bis doubt, dispelled 
by the tremendous will of tbe woman. 

From tbe beginning of tbe drama, every thing has 
been growing darker and more threatening ; but, as if to 
give a little respite before it comes to the worst, the sun 
shines out for a short while in that sweet landscape where 
Duncan is moving on with sacrificial meekness to his 
slaughter. When you consider the treacherous and mur- 
derous plottings going on between the guilty-seeking pair 
within the castle, a most solemn contrast may be disco- 
vered in the brief colloquy beneath its walls between the 
pure-hearted Duncan and the equally innocent and noble 
Banquo. It is the perfection of pathos, as a prelude to 
the assassination scene ; and, indeed, when Shakspeare 
seeks to impress us with the deepest sense of human cha- 
racter and feeling, the poetic power is in nothing more 
admirably shown than in the harmony he creates between 
the material world and the spiritual world in the breast 
of man. You have here, for instance, the placid temper 



394 LECTURE SECOND. 



of the meek monarcli — his heart stirred only by affections 
as pure as the fragrant rural air that lightly touched his 
brow. You have the unclouded candour of Banquo's 
hearty and overhead are the blue heavens, which seem to 
be a reflection of it. Their hearts are touched with the 
beauty of the earth, air, and sky, and with a sympathy 
with the cheerful birds that are hovering over their de- 
voted heads. 

The same poetic harmony between the immaterial and 
material world appears in the tempestuous night when 
the crime is perpetrated — a moral tempest of passions 
within, and a physical tempest of the elements without. 
Macbeth's powerful intellect is again busy with reflections 
and reasonings j but it is not so much the actual guilt he 
recoils from, or its dread penalty in a life to come, as the 
retribution in his mortal life. There is something of infi- 
del audacity in his allusion to an hereafter : 

" That but this blow 
Might be the be-all and the end all here, 
But here, upon this bank and shoal of time, — 
We'd jump the life to come. But, in these cases, 
We still have judgment here ; that we but teach 
Bloody instructions, which, being taught, return 
To plague the inventor. This even-handed justice 
Commends the ingredients of our poison'd chalice 
To our own lips." 

His active mind dwells on subordinate considerations of 
treason — disloyalty — the breach of trust in murdering his 
guest — his kinsman — ^his king — a meek monarch — a train 
of thought which rises, indeed, to a pitch of wild subli- 
mity in the contemplation of the crime : 

" He's here in double trust : 
First, as I am his kinsman — and his subject, 



MACBETH. 395 

Strong both against the deed; then, as his host. 
Who should against his murderer shut the door, 
Not bear the knife myself. Besides, this Duncan 
Hath borne his faculties so meek, hath been 
So clear in his great office, that his virtues 
"Will plead like angels, trumpet-tongued, against 
The deep damnation of his taking off: 
And pity, like a naked new-born babe, 
Striding the blast, or heaven's cherubim, hors'd 
Upon the sightless couriers of the air. 
Shall blow the horrid deed in every eye 
That tears shall drown the wind/' 

At the entrance of his wife he relapses from these agita- 
tions of conscience to the more prudential reflections — 

" We will proceed no further in this business : 
He hath honoured me of late : and I have bought 
Golden opinions from all sorts of people. 
Which would be worn now in their newest gloss, 
Not cast aside so soon." 

For an instant he seems innocent, and the 'wicked pur- 
pose cast away; but this cannot safely be inferred merely 
because the words are used. Indeed, in the study of 
Shakspeare, a false meaning is often attributed by read- 
ing a passage narratively instead of dramatically. The 
words may express only one of the struggles of a weak 
conscience and a strong intellect; and the sincerity of 
them may well be questioned when you reflect on the en- 
tire inadequacy of the reasons he assigns in so momentous 
a question — gratitude to the king and his lately-earned 
popularity. The one great question, whether he shall be 
a murderer, he takes no thought of; and this shows the 
moral condition of his mind. Besides, he has just la- 
mented that he has no spur to prick the sides of his 



LECTURE SECOND. 



intent^ wliicli now he seems to invite by this apparent 
relinquishment. Lady Macbeth^ with a perfect know- 
ledge of her husband's character, treats his expression as 
a mere flattering of his conscience. She artfully taunts 
him with indecision, goads him with reproaches, and, as 
if to awe his spirit by wild exaggerations of her own 
energy, she breaks out into that terrific boast, that rather 
than forswear herself, she would pluck the babe from her 
breast and hideously destroy it. 

The guilt deepens, and the supernatural atmosphere 
thickens at the same time. On the unruly night of the 
murder, a storm was raging, and, doubtless, the witches 
were riding on the blast and untying the whirlwinds ; for 
there were 

" Lamen tings heard i' the air; strange screams of death. 
And prophesying, with accents terrible. 
Of dire combustion and confused events, 
New-hatch'd to the woful time. 
The obscure bird clamour'd the livelong night; 
Some say the earth was feverous, and did shake." 

The whole domain of Macbeth's castle is impregnated 
with the supernatural atmosphere — visions and dreams 
and spiritual voices, Banquo's dream of the weird sisters, 
and the bosom-weight of his gloomy presentiments. Dun- 
can's horses, too — 

"Beauteous and swift, the minions of their race— 
Turn'd wild in nature, broke their stalls, flung out, 
Contending 'gainst obedience, as they would make 
War with mankind." 

But more terrible is the tumult in the soul of Macbeth. 
The intensity of effort powerfully affects the imaginative 



MACBETH. 397 



element in his mind. Where he moves, there is a vision 
of the air-drawn dagger with gouts of blood npon the 
blade, the broken sleep of the surfeited grooms, their 
laughter, their terror, and screams of murder, and their 
prayers, and the wild curse in the air of eternal wakeful- 
ness — all this created or magnified, and distorted through 
the medium of a murderer's burning brain. The plead- 
ings of conscience had before been hardly audible — he 
had heard only the suggestions of prudence and expedi- 
ency; but, at the instant of the murder, the new utter- 
ance of a blood-stained conscience strikes into his very 
soul : 

" Methought I heard a voice cry — * Sleep no more ! 
Macbeth does murder sleep, the innocent sleep ; 
Sleep, that knits up the ravell'd sleave of care, 
The death of each day's life, sore labour's bath, 
Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course, 
Chief nourisher in life's feast ;' * "*' * 
Still it cried — ' Sleep no more !' to all the house : 
* Glamis hath murder'd sleep ; and therefore Cawdor 
Shall sleep no more, Macbeth shall sleep no more !' " 

All the emotions which had been ebbing and flowing in 
his spirit before the commission of the crime, now rush 
in one resistless tide. His senses are wound up to a 
torturing acuteness; one question after another breaks 
strangely from him. Amid his bewilderment and agony, 
his constitutional activity of mind assumes a preternatural 
rapidity. Thoughts and reflections are close crowded in 
these agitated moments. His wife is confounded by that 
apostrophe to sleep, which serves to illustrate the mind of 
Macbeth, and perhaps to show that he had held back the 
dagger in contemplation of the sweet sleep of the confid- 



LECTURE SECOND. 



ing Duncan. He avows his dismay at the thought of 
what he had done and his inability to look on it again. 
Fancied voices have alarmed him, and now the simplest 
sounds strike terror to his soul. The brave man, the sol- 
dier, becomes conscious of the change ; for, on the knock- 
ing at the gate, he exclaims — 

**How is't with me, when every noise appals me?" 

Nor is it only through one sense that terrors are over- 
whelming him ; he looks upon his hands, and the sorry 
sight of Duncan's blood upon them ^^ plucks out his eyes.'' 
His phrensied imagination, hopeless of any cleansing, sees 
blood enough there to stain the ocean, to ^^ incarnadine 
the multitudinous seas.'' The condition of his feelings is 
further shown by contrast with the partner of his guilt. 
She has no thought but of the business on hand : she 
hears none but natural sounds — the knocking at the gate 
is precisely known by her, whose senses are not bewil- 
dered by fancies ; and it strikes a chill to the very heart 
when, though Duncan's corpse is scarcely cold, we hear 
her say to her husband — 

" The sleeping and the dead 
Are but as pictures." 

And, after she, too, has dabbled in the murdered man's 

blood — 

"A little water clears us of this deed." 

The murderer himself has sunk into a reverie from which 
with difficulty he is roused by his wife ; and then one 
burst of repentant agony, and the scene is over — per- 
haps the most appalling scene in all dramatic literature. 
Macbeth has worked out his own destiny ; he " has it 



MACBETH. 399 

now, king, Cawdor, Grlamis, all, as the weird women pro- 
mised/^ Let us now consider the new era of life he has 
entered on, and see how the presence of one guilty re- 
membrance shall be to him like a triumphant demon in 
his soul. The more obvious effects of guilt upon his cha- 
racter I need not trace; for they are plain enough to 
show that fearful truth in the study of human nature, 
that there is no limit to the hardening of the heart or to 
the perversion of the understanding. The assassination 
is quickly followed by the remorseless slaughter of the 
innocent grooms ; and the shedding of blood becomes to 
him an ordinary means of attaining his ends. The pro- 
gress of criminality I need not dwell upon ; but let me 
rather seek to trace some of the more recondite influences 
upon Macbeth' s nature. 

There is, in one of these scenes, an expression of Ban- 
quo's which, simple as it is, I have been deeply impressed 
with in studying this great work of poetic art. When the 
death of Duncan is first discovered, and the inmates of 
the castle are fearfully startled from their slumbers — none 
but the guilty pair knowing whence the crime came — 
amid the consternation and panic echoing through the 
chambers and courts, Banquo is the first to restore some 
little composure by these simple words : 

"In the great hand of God I stand; and, thence 
Against the undivulged pretence I fight 
Of treasonous malice." 

In the darkness of undetected danger — the natural 
sense of safety destroyed by the presence of secret assassi- 
nation that is revealed only by the voiceless witness of 
Duncan's bleeding body — there is a sublimity in this lofty 



LECTURE SECOND. 



confidence, for it is the strength of an innocent and faith- 
ful spirit. 

From Banquo, strong in the faith that he is standing in 
the great hand of God, turn to Macbeth, strong in the 
possession of his guilt-earned power. He is beset by the 
torment of new doubts and fears ; the restlessness of his 
conscience makes distant and imaginary evils a present, 
perpetual, and pressing torture. He envies the murdered 
dead their repose in the tomb : 

" Better be with the dead, 
Whom we, to gain our place, have sent to peace, 
Than on the torture of the mind to lie 
In restless ecstasy. Duncan is in his grave : 
After life's fitful fever he sleeps weU ; 
Treason has done his worst ; nor steel nor poison. 
Malice domestic, foreign levy, nothing 
Can touch him further !" 

The silent rebuke of Banquo's better nature is a grow- 
ing misery to him, with the added dread that his sceptre 
is a barren one, to be wrenched from his grasp by an un- 
lineal hand, no son of his succeeding. The anguish of 
his conscience now travels in this direction : 

" full of scorpions is my mind, dear wife ! 
Thou know'st,that Banquo, and his Fleance, lives." 

'^ There's comfort yet,'^ he thinks, in their destruction ; 
but when his former companion-in-arms is treacherously 
murdered, a new agony comes upon him — convulsions of 
a guilty imagination, which calls up, even at a festival, 
the spectre of the blood-boltered Banquo, glaring and 
shaking his gory locks at him. 

Let it be remembered that I am tracing the career of 



MACBETH. 401 



no common murderer^ wliom familiarity with blood miglit 
only imbnite, but of one wbose capacious intellect is 
made to feel^ more and more, bow unreal every thing be- 
comes to a soul that has cast out the spiritual elements 
of its humanity. Macbeth cannot, as Banquo did, look 
up to the great hand of Grod, for to him it can only be 
the hand of an avenger. His spirit, craving for something 
more than the support of mere material power, seeks fur- 
ther communion with the witches. He tampers with the 
" dark and midnight hags,'' who, with incantations and 
prophetic sorceries, weave their toils closer and closer 
around him, and then vanish forever with his curse upon 
them and upon himself 

" Infected be the air whereon they ride, 
And damn'd all those that trust them !" 

Observe, too, that, at the very time the witches have 
deluded their victim with promises that seem to make 
^'assurance double sure," although he feels that he has 
taken a bond of destiny, his evil faith actuates him to 
new works of blood : 

" From this moment, 
The very firstlings of my heart shall b8 
The firstlings of my hand. And even now 
To crown my thoughts with acts, be it thought and done : 
The castle of Macduff I will surprise ; 
Seize upon Fife ; give to the edge o' the sword 
His wife, his babes, and all unfortunate souls 
That trace his line — no boasting like a fool." 

The supernatural in the tragedy is now fading fast 
away; and, ere we come to the catastrophe, we almost 
forget the witchery of the weird sisters ; their malice has 

26 



LECTURE SECOND. 



been acMeved, and then all is left to human vice, human 
passion, human misery. The high-wrought spirituality 
of the tragedy has its sublime ending in the " slumbry 
agitation" of Lady Macbeth, — that temfic, open-eyed 
sleep-walking, sleep-talking, — and the never-ending misery 
of the blood-stained hand, with the appalling incoheren- 
cies of the hauntings of guilt : 

" Out, damned spot I out, I say ! . . . Yet who 
would have thought the old man to have had so much 
blood in him ? . . . The thane of Fife had a wife ; 
where is she now ? . . . I tell you yet again, Ban- 
quo's buried ; he cannot come out of his grave. . . . 
Here's the smell of blood still : all the perfumes of Arabia 
will not sweeten this little hand.'' Her waking imagina- 
tion had been dull, but now there is a morbid activity of 
the fancy in sleep. Her force of character, which for a 
while seemed superhuman, has given way : but still it is 
in keeping with the character of this strong-willed woman 
that her remorse is only distantly discovered in her 
dreams. Darkness seems to have terrors for her, for her 
attendant says — "She has light by her continually ; 'tis 
her command." The wretched woman perishes a hope- 
less suicide. 

Macbeth is left alone. A deadly heart-sickness is con- 
suming him : it is broken only by a desperate and fitful 
energy to fire again the soldier's spirit in his heart, which 
soon sinks into a despondency deeply pathetic : 

" This push 
"Will cheer me ever, or disseat me now. 
I have lived long enough : my way of life 
Is fallen into the sere the yellow leaf: 
And that which should accompany old age. 



MACBETH. 403 



As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends, 
I must not look to have ; but in their stead, 
Curses, not loud, but deep, mouth-honour, breath 
Which the poor heart would fain deny, but dare not." 

He finds that he has been paltered with by the double 
senses of sorcery. The sea of blood is sweeping him on- 
ward, helpless and hopeless ; for its red tide has washed 
out, one by one, the promises which witchcraft had writ- 
ten upon sand. 

Throughout this drama, one of its most remarkable 
impressions is, that we retain, not, indeed, a sympathy, 
but a pity for the ruin of the hero. It is a feeling 
wholly different from the unhealthy admiration excited in 
a vicious school of sentimental romance for its worthless 
personages. Shakspeare has never suffered the interest 
in the character of Macbeth to be wholly extinguished, 
and, appropriately, he gives him the dignity of a soldier's 
death. 

The moral catastrophe is more deeply laid. In the life 
of man there are two results of goodness and a well-poised 
faith which, for their impressive beauty, appear to me es- 
pecially worthy of the deepest reflection : one is, that in 
a course of existence thus controlled, there is an unbroken 
continuity; the stream of life flows on in its appointed 
channel, leaving no ruin behind, and with a sunlight ever 
before. The past, the present, and the future are blended 
together in the mind by happy memories — a happy con- 
sciousness and the hopefulness of faith. " The thought 
of past years doth breed perpetual benediction,''* and 
there is a tranquil looking forward to the future. The 

-:;:- Wordsworth's Ode on the Intimations of Immortality from Recol- 
lections of Early Childhood. Works, p. 387. 



404 LECTURE SECOND. 



other result is, that familiar things are the oftener regarded 
as symbols of that spiritual world which gives reality to 
our being — a feeling without which the heart sinks down 
in dismal and dreary despondency from its sense of hol- 
lowness, and with which the heart leaps up with the as- 
surance of its own undying strength. Xow, I have referred 
to these considerations because it is to the very opposite 
of all this that the soul of Macbeth is brought in the ex- 
tremity of his career of guilt. It is that condition of 
mind — the lowest pitch of infidel despair — which looks on 
life as utt-erly vain and meaningless. From the innocence 
of his early days he feels separated by a dread gulf of 
crime ; and, for the future, all is impenetrable darkness. 
This is the moral catastrophe of the tragedy, and I do 
not know how I can so well express these opposite condi- 
tions to which the soul maybe either raised or sunk, than 
by citing what alone is adecpate to express the emotions 
which accompany them — the language of poetry. The 
first of them — the exulting joy of a faithful, thoughtful 
spirit, quickly sensitive to any token which gives assu- 
rance of the covenant between things human and divine, 
and happy in its memoiy of childhood — has been ex- 
pressed when a poet exclaimed — 

"Aly heart leaps up when I behold 

A rainbow in the sky : 
So was it when my life began. 
So is it now I am a man, 
So be it when I shall grow old,. 

Or let me die I 
The child is father of the man ; 
And I could wish my days to be 
Bound each to each by natural piety."* 

* Wordsworth's works, p. 27. 



MACBETH. 405 



Now, by the side of this, listen to what is almost the last 
voice that comes from the weary soul of Macbeth : 

"To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, 
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, 
To the last syllable of recorded time ; 
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools 
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle ! 
Life's but a walking shadow ; a poor player. 
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage. 
And then is heard no more : it is a tale 
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury. 
Signifying nothing." 

The terrors of the tragedy have subsided into this deeply 
pathetic strain ; and, hollow as this contemplative melan- 
choly is, it still wins from us enough of sympathy to make 
us feel that we are standing amid the ruins of a soul 
which was worthy of a better destiny. 



LECTURE in* 

iamkt. 

In passing from the tragedy of Macbefh to ttat of 
Hamlet, the transition is a very wide one. Both dramas, 
indeed, have their supernatural agencies — strange, spi- 
ritual things made real to the imagination; and the 
respective heroes are not unlike in a certain constitu- 
tional reflectiveness of mind. In the Scottish usurper, 
as well as in the young Danish prince, there is a touch 
of philosophy. But, while in the tragedy of Macbeth 
there is, I may almost say, a throng of supernatural 
forms detested and terrific — ^the witches, with all their 
train of apparitions, that rose around their cauldron, 
and the blood-boltered spectre of Banquo — in Hamlet 
there is one solitary and majestic phantom; and, instead 
of that lurid, supernatural light which was fitfully break- 
ing upon the former tragedy, we seem to behold now 
one solemn and awful shadow hanoino; over the course 
of the drama. The meditative moods of Macbeth's mind 
were no more than bubbles, borne onward upon the sur- 
face of that rapid and violent tide which hurried the 



* December 20th, 1842. 

406 



II A !<I L E T. 407 



movement of the play; but in Hamlet^ the philosophic 
habit of his intellect is the chief element in the tragedy 
— the ruling principle which gives to it its gentle and 
slow progression. Nor is this intellectual character pe- 
culiar to the chief person ; for, besides the profound and 
feeling thoughtfulness of Hamlet, you find the insincere 
and declamatory reasoning of the king, the self-compla- 
cent shrewdness of the old politician in Polonius, the 
fraternal counsels of Laiertes, and, in perfect keeping 
with the predominant tone of the tragedy, the logic of 
the captious grave-digger — a most thoughtful, reasoning 
company. In this respect, it seems to me that this 
drama, more than any other, may be regarded as emi- 
nently reflecting the constitution of Shakspeare's mind 
— as the production in which he incorporated, more 
largely than any other, the habits of his intellect. 

If the question were asked — What personage in the 
whole range, not only of dramatic literature, but of all 
fiction, has gained the deepest, the most pleasing, and 
universal interest? — the answer, I am inclined to be- 
lieve, which cultivated minds would be most apt to give, 
would be. The character of Hamlet. Now it would be a 
very shallow efibrt were I to seek an explanation of this 
deep and widespread interest in the outward story of the 
play, its plot and incidents and catastrophe. The mystery 
is not to be solved thus ; something more inward must be 
sought to explain it — to show how it is in accordance 
with our common human-heartedness. Nay, more than 
this : it is not enough to discover in what respects this 
poem is illustrative and typical of the mere feelings and 
thoughts of humanity, for I believe that its sublime phi- 
losophy consists in this — that in it we are carried into 



408 LECTURE THIRD. 



tliat region of our spiritual nature which is not peculiar 
or variable in different human beings, and which is not 
susceptible of degrees, such as we attribute to intellect or 
sentiment ; it carries us through the domain of passion 
and thought into that spiritual region where naught is 
known but what is illimitable and eternal — the human 
soul. It need not, therefore, cause our wonder that this 
tragedy has much about it that is mysterious, obscure, 
and perplexed to critic and to commentator; for it deals 
with the greatest of all mysteries — that imperishable 
principle of the personality of each human being — that 
eternal something which, at our birth, gathers up for a 
mysterious combination the earthly elements of our bo- 
dies, and, after travelling on through the mortal life, 
scatters those elements at death like the light, lifeless 
leaves of autumn. Entertaining the thought I do of the 
tragedy of Hamlet, I find myself approaching it — to say 
with diffidence would feebly express it, but with a convic- 
tion of the greater or less inadequacy of all criticism for 
the exposition of its sublime imaginings. It is a subject 
to be thought upon, much rather than talked of. 

Let it, however, be remembered that, according to the 
plan of my course, I am considering these dramas as illus- 
trations of the main subject of tragic poetry. If, in ac- 
cordance with the definition given by an ancient philoso- 
pher, we traced a chastening of the passions by the 
agency of pity in King Lear, and in Macbeth by the 
agency rather of terror, we may discover in Hamlet 
another of the uses of tragedy in showing that mournful 
thoughts and the sad conflicts of humanity have a power 
of their own to make known the strength and weakness 
of the soul — all that lies hid there, and which men rarely 



HAMLET. 40J 



become conscious of in the trivial chances of life or in its 
placid periods. A deeper self-consciousness is awakened 
from its slumbers by tlie tumultuous movements of tlie 
soul — disappointment, affliction, or anguish. It is thus 
the hidden energies of the spirit are disclosed, just as the 
unfelt and unknown strength of a nation is brought into 
action by the necessities and tribulations of war. 

In King Lear we had occasion to study the career of a 
human spirit under the stern discipline of affliction — a 
heart palpitating under Promethean torture; for filial in- 
gratitude had "tied sharp-toothed unkindness like a vul- 
ture there." In Macbeth we followed the career of a 
spirit through its yieldings to temptation ; but in Hamlet 
the influences are far more complex. The tragedy is a 
story of a soul environed by all the agencies which are 
best fitted to reveal its functions and its aspirations ; and 
the imagination of Shakspeare, after embodying in the 
character of Hamlet the elements of a susceptible spirit, 
has gathered around that spirit every influence which 
could aptly touch it. He has shown this character in the 
despondency of an unavailing sorrow; another while in 
the sunshine of a cheerful thoughtfulness ; again in the 
distress of disturbed afi'ections, in the perplexity of obscure 
and conflicting duties ; and again in the solemn awe of a 
supernatural influence. The observation we have to take 
is of the starlike light of Hamlet's soul dwelling apart in 
the region of a lofty self-communion, and moving onward 
in its path like one of " that host," as it has been finely 
called, "of white-robed pilgrims that travel along the 
vault of the nightly sky.'' We are to observe the light 
of his life shining, serenely shining, from the large and 
placid spaces of his own gentle and noble and thoughtful 



410 LECTURE THIRD. 



nature, or else struggling with either the mists of earthly 
sorrow, or the lurid, supernatural reflection that reaches it 
from the prison-house of the suffering dead. Now, let us 
inquire, what is the character of Hamlet, before the tragic 
influences are brought to bear upon it. The flrst mention 
of him is of "young Hamlet." He is a prince, the heir- 
apparent to the throne of Denmark, the son of a most 
majestic monarch — a father whom he as deeply honoured 
as he dearly loved ; for about that parent there were the 
grandeur of an heroic warrior and the graceful gentleness 
of domestic virtue. We are told of the frown that dark- 
ened his brow — 

" When, in an angry parle, 
He smote the sledded Polack on the ice/* 

and we are also told of the tender affection to his queen, 

that — 

" He might not beteem the winds of heaven 
Visit her face too roughly^' — 

a love for her which was " of that dignity that it went 
hand in hand even with the vow he made to her in mar- 
riage.'^ Hamlet was the son, too, of an "all-seeming vir- 
tuous mother," the loving wife of his father; and thus he 
had grown to manhood amid those happy, virtuous house- 
hold influences that are the best atmosphere for the young 
heart to live in. To the attractions of manly form and 
feature, he has added the accomplishments which befit 
his high birth ; and, what is more rare as a princely aim, 
he has learnt the delights of communion with the re- 
corded wisdom of poets and philosophers. It was not 
enough for him to be crowned with the pride of expectant 
royalty, he must also wear the milder glory of scholar- 



HAMLET. 411 



ship ; and how much his heart is in this^ is seen when, in 
the sympathy which common studies engender, he greets 
his friend Horatio as his ^^ fellow-student.'^ I do not 
know that there is a character in all the large company 
of the Shaksperian drama upon whom the poet has, from 
the exuberance of his imagination, bestowed such abun- 
dant and various graciousness. You may observe in 
Hamlet the princely dignity, and that indescribable and 
instinctive deference to the feelings of others, which con- 
stitutes the gentlemanly spirit; you have the gallant bear- 
ing of the soldier, and that meditative composure which 
philosophy may give. 

Nor is it only in these acquirements that the character 
of Hamlet is arrayed with so much grace : it has a beauty 
in its large portion of those feelings which, independent 
of social or intellectual rank, adorn humanity. He clings 
to Horatio with the steady zeal of a fast friendship, and 
the deeper susceptibility of his heart is shown in the love 
for Ophelia, which endured till his destiny demanded the 
sad sacrifice of it. 

Hamlet has just crossed the threshold of manhood, and 
what more could be added to give him dignity and grace ? 
Young and beautiful, the pride of the palace, and, better 
still, an indweller in spirit in the palaces of wisdom and 
learning, elevated by the memories of an heroic ancestry 
and by noble expectations for the future, and happy, too, 
in the depth of his affections — this is life in its purest 
and most serene region of thought and feeling — all is 
bright and innocent and joyous, but the elements of tra- 
gedy are darker. 

The first change that comes over a prospect so sunny, 
the first tragic influence which touches the nature of 



412 LECTURE THIRD. 



Hamlet is the sudden sorrowing for his father. That vir- 
tuous freedom from care, which belongs to that period of 
life spent beneath the paternal roof, and to that period 
alone, has ceased upon the unexpected ending of his 
father's life. The object, to which had been devoted all 
the reverential affection of a nature so thoughtful and 
sensitive, is suddenly taken away. When Hamlet first 
appears, you behold the stricken heart of filial piety. 
Amid the pomp and pageantry of the court he stands a 
mourner near the throne; and the appeal is a vain one to 
him, when he is unworthily and unfeelingly entreated to 
cast his sorrow away : 

" Do not forever with thy vailed lids 
Seek for thy noble father in the dust." 

This was, doubtless, the first time the arrow of death 
had passed so near him ; and probably there is no influ- 
ence on the human spirit comparable to that when sepa- 
ration by death is, for the first time, deeply and really 
felt. The ending of life is, for the most part, too familiar 
to be felt : we meet the funeral procession, and it gives 
us scarce a second thought : we hear of the departure of 
some one known to us, and we are surprised or sorry, but 
these are momentary emotions, upon the very surface too. 
When, for the first time, death invades our own house- 
hold, perhaps we are too young to heed it : the brief be- 
wilderment of childhood soon gives way to the innocent 
vanity — the excusable self-importance of the new suit of 
mourning. But when death for the first time makes 
itself truly felt — when some sudden separation of what 
life had closely bound together, startles us to the very 
centre of our being, there is no greater power to drive 



HAMLET. 413 



the soul into itself in its struggles witli that dreary sense 
of craving after what is gone from our bodily eyes forever 
— ^that utter casting down of the heart when the mourner 
comes back from the fresh grave to the desolate house. 
The earnestness of life is blunted, and the very sun in 
the sky shines less brightly than it did before. Pleasant 
memories are converted into sad associations, and we feel, 

" Where'er we go, 
That there hath past away a glory from the earth."* 

Nor is this influence of a genuine grief confined merely 
to our emotions; it powerfully agitates the intellectual 
part of man. Let me call it a spiritual rather than a 
mere intellectual struggle, when the heart in its loneli- 
ness is groping after the dead. When the life which 
animated some familiar form is extinguished — the fire 
quenched with which the substance of the eye was 
lighted, we are strangely perplexed, because we are left 
without the means of apprehending the new life which 
follows after the mortal life. The bodily elements which 
used to be known to our senses — things of sight and 
sound — are left to perish until the soul shall gather them 
up again ; and the dead are, perhaps, separated from the 
living only so far as this, that the spiritual existence and 
that mysterious combination of spirit and matter, which 
we call life, cannot take cognizance of each other. Yet, 
impenetrable as this barrier is, who can tell how slight it 
may be ! Death may be no more than such a separation : 
this earth, which has its visible world of living material 
things, may have also its invisible spiritual world of the 

* Wordsworth's Ode on Intimations of Immortality. 



414 LECTURE THIRD. 



myriads of the dead, whose bodies have been commingled 
with the dust, or whose bones are drifting in the fathom- 
less caverns of the sea. Now, the struggle of a strong and 
thoughtful grief is to overleap these barriers which are 
impassable to mortality. Its aspirations would reach be- 
yond the inevitable limits of its materialism; and its 
intense yearnings after the dead are not to be satisfied by 
sufiering its fancies to travel to the tomb, but strive to 
follow the imperishable particle which was the very life 
of what the grave receives. Hopeless as its questionings 
may be, the soul of the survivor sends them after the dis- 
embodied spirit — a process of thought and feeling whicl? 
has been thus described as from a mourner's own lips : 

" I called on dreams and visions to disclose 
That which is veiled from waking thought; ^jnjured 
Eternity, as men constrain a ghost, 
To appear and answer; to the grave I spake 
Imploringly — looked up, and asked the heavCtei 
If angels traversed their cerulean floors, 
If fixed or wandering star could tidings yield 
Of the departed spirit — what abode 
It occupies — what consciousness retains 
Of former loves and interests. Then my soul 
Turned inward— to examine of what stuff 
Time's fetters are composed ; and life was put 
To inquisition long and profitless 
By pain of heart, now checked and now impelled, 
The intellectual power, through words and things, 
Went sounding on, a dim and perilous way !"* 

The active and fine intellect of Hamlet has received 
what is at once the shock and the impulse of profound 
grief. His shaping imagination i^ busy in fashioning the 



* "Wordsworth's Excursion, b. iii. (Despondency. 



HAMLET. 415 



likeness of Ms dead father's form — now made visible to 
his ^^ mind's eye/' that happy expression which Shak- 
speare has made so familiar to all who speak our English 
tongue.* And how dear had that form in life been to 
his eyes may be known from the enthusiastic admiration 
he gives utterance to, when, afterwards describing to his 
mother the picture of her first husband, his own honoured 
father, he says — 

" See, what a grace was seated on this brow : 
Hyperion's curls ; — the front of Jove himself; 
An eye like Mars, to threaten and command ; 
A station like the herald Mercury, 
New-lighted on a heaven-kissing hillj 
A combination and a form indeed, 
Where every god did seem to set his seal, 
To give the world assurance of a man." 

From the glowing words of this description, we may 
perceive how Hamlet's imagination had been filled with 



* In a private letter written soon after, my brother thus playfully 
refers to this familiar phrase : 

"I have always regarded the 'mind's eye' as eminently and pecu- 
liarly a Shakspearian phrase, his originally and nobody else's; but, in 
a volume of minor Greek poets, looking for something or other, I 
chanced on the phrase ^vxni "oyma in some lines by Naumachius; and 
yet, may be that is the ' soul's eye,' which makes a diflFerence. Pray, 
who was professor of Greek when Hamlet was a student at Witten- 
berg? and was the 'Poetae Minores' one of the text-books in use? 
What a pity it was not Horatio that used the phrase; for he is so pre- 
cise and matter-of-fact, that he would certainly have told us where he 
got it, with, perhaps, a reference ; while Hamlet was very much the 
kind of man to use the phrase, with some little alteration, and say 
nothing about original authorities — or may be it was a sort of uncon- 
scious (S. T. C.) plagiarism." MS. Letter, 28th February, 1845. 

W. B. R. 



416 LECTURE THIRD. 



the glorious ideal forms of classic fable ; and it is worth 
noticing, that the very first feeling attributed to him is an 
anxiety to go back to the calm retreat of his academic 
life at Wittenberg, to resume that happy communion 
with the good and wise of all ages which no villainy can 
betray. 

It is not only sorrow that is weighing down the heart 
of Hamlet. Even the sad seclusion of grief is not 
allowed to him. He finds himself cheated of his inherit- 
ance ; and the succession, and the detested paternity that 
is thrust upon him, inflame ill-suppressed feelings of 
indignation and resentment. Dark misgivings, too, as 
we afterwards learn, are flitting across his mind and cast- 
ing shadows of suspicion too dreadful for him to give 
utterance to — presentiments of that supernatural revela- 
tion which discloses to him the mystery of his father's 
murder. Worse than all this is the anguish of disap- 
pointment in his once-loved mother, the once '^most 
seeming virtuous queen." Memories of his father's deep 
and honourable love crowd upon his mind. Unable and 
unwilling to cast away his duty, and perhaps afi"ection, to 
her, he is agitated by the reluctant conviction that she is 
unworthy of it; and thus, the sentiment of filial piety, 
which ought to flow in a placid current, is changed into 
a broken and fretted tide. Such are the trials that come 
upon the unprepared spirit of one who had been the 
happy inmate of a virtuous palace, had breathed the pure 
atmosphere of domestic love and honour, and whose en- 
thusiasm had been elevated by the heroic associations 
and trophies of his illustrious father, and not less by 
ideal visions of truth in the unclouded regions of phi- 
losophy. He is suddenly in a situation where sorrows 



HAMLET. 417 



press upon him, which are agonies to such a spirit as 
his; and yet, see, withal, how graceful a gentleness he 
maintains! Indeed, from the indecorous tone in which 
he is addressed both by king and queen, we might be- 
lieve that his life had been characterized by that scho- 
lastic gentleness, which the unworthy might be tempted 
to presume upon. The king speaks to him, and H^amlet 
recoils with a play upon words which serves to disguise 
his deep and disturbed feelings. The queen speaks, and 
he answers with respect and with reserve; for, while 
dutifully remembering that she is his mother, he cannot 
forget that she is his father's fickle and faithless widow. 
His dearest wish is to withdraw into the recesses of his 
sorrowing meditations; but he is molested by cold com- 
monplaces on the subject of death, and by reproaches 
of the fidelity of his grief — a grief so inward and self- 
communing, that, to confound it with the mere outward 
customary signs was, indeed, a heartless imputation. 
The usurper takes up the reproachful strain from the 
lips of the queen; beginning with empty compliments, 
and ending with the empty promises of hypocrisy, he 
tells Hamlet that the filial obligation was discharged by 
the obsequious sorrow already shown, and that now it 
was an obstinate condolement — a course of impious stub- 
bornness — an unmanly grief, showing a will most incor- 
rect to heaven — a heart unfortified — a mind impatient — 
an understanding simple and unschooled — a fault to 
heaven — a fault against the dead — a fault to nature — 
to reason most absurd. To this heaping of reproaches 
of the very kind to wound so sensitive and thought- 
ful a spirit, Hamlet answers not a word — it is the 



27 



418 LECTURE THIRD. 



silence of an almost breaking heart, as lie afterwards 

says — 

" But break my heart, for I must hold my tongue." 

These are the first of those conflicts of the heart which 
disturb Hamlet's nature. There is the double disap- 
pointment of his filial piety — the death of his noble 
father and the moral degradation of his mother : all 
his gentle propensities, too, are frustrated, his longing 
for scholastic solitude is thwarted, and his lonely self- 
communion violated by intrusion. Constraint is on him, 
and he is forced to dwell amid the unruly revelry of a 
riotous palace — so changed, too, from what it was — and 
in the detested presence of all that his spirit is at va- 
riance with. Now, the natural consequence of such a 
state of mind is, a wretched weariness of life, which 
comes sadly across the young heart when the natural 
tide of its hopes and affections is suddenly and violently 
arrested — when misanthropy is forced into a spirit 
whose native element is love. His first free utterance 
is when he breaks forth, the very moment he is left 
alone, in that piteous and incoherent soliloquy, which 
admirably presents the characteristic condition of his 
mind — a combination of great intellectual activity with 
deep moral sensibility manifest in the perpetual com- 
mingling of meditations and emotions. A blight has 
touched his young heart, and not only the palace — his 
home — ^but the whole earth is dreary to him : so young, 
he is already longing after the repose of the grave, and a 
wish for self-destruction is checked only by a sense of 
man's duty to the everlasting : he sorrows most of all 
that he must live. All his pent-up and conflicting 



HAMLET. 419 



feelings are seeking relief at once; and the words that 
give utterance to them are expressive, at the same time, 
of his affection and admiration for his departed father, an- 
tipathy and contempt for his kinsman, the usurper, and 
— the worst misery of all — the heart-sickening thoughts 
of his mother's infidelity. 

Throughout this drama, in every soliloquy or speech of 
Hamlet, you may discover, not only the extraordinary in- 
tellectual activity which Shakspeare has given to the cha- 
racter, but also a wonderful susceptibility of sentiment, 
which is one of its chief charms. I know of no dramatic 
character in which the processes of thought are so rapid 
and so complex, and the associations of ideas so quick 
and various. We seem to feel the depth and purity of 
Hamlet's spirit the more, when we contemplate the 
thoughts and feelings which perpetually are speeding 
so quickly over it, just as to the eye the steadfast firma- 
ment has a purer blue and a more measureless height, 
because of the flying haste of the clouds upon a bright 
and breezy day; or, rather, to vary the similitude, the 
pathetic beauty of Hamlet's character impresses us the 
more from its inimitable variety, like the shifting glory 
of an autumnal sunset, changing, at each instant chang- 
ing — the bright foreshadowing of twilight and darkness. 

Immediately after the agonized soliloquy, the entrance 
of Horatio and the gentlemen to whom the ghost had 
appeared, gives another aspect of Hamlet's character. 
His deep and painful self-communions are hushed, and 
it is, indeed, very beautiful to see him at once casting 
aside all considerations of self in his friendly address to 
his fellow-student. He will not believe Horatio's avowal 
of a truant disposition ; but, after the momentary divci • 



420 L E C T U E E T H I K D. 



sion of affectionate greeting, his dark thouglits are forced 
backj first in a painful sense of princely shame that his 
friend should witness the disgraceful debauchery of the 
royal household. 

Horatio's answer leads onto still more painful thoughts ; 
and yet there is a most attractive grace in the sincerity 
and pathos with which Hamlet partly opens his heart to 
his friend : 

Horatio. My lord, I came to see your father's funeral. 
Hamlet. I pray thee, do not mock me, fellow-student; 
I think it was to see my mother's wedding. 

As soon as Horatio replies, 

" Indeed, my lord, it followed hard upon," 

there comes one of those characteristic quick transitions 
of feeling; for Hamlet, as if conscious of having laid 
bare too much of his lonely thoughts, even to his friend, 
rallies with somewhat of a bitter jest — that severe jesting 
which freci[uently breaks from him, not forced, but natural 
to deep and suppressed emotions, which seem to find in 
it a kind of relief. He tells Horatio that the marriage so 
speedy after the burial was excellent economy — there was 
no waste : 

"Thrift, thrift, Horatio I the funeral bak'd meats. 
Did coldly furnish forth the marriage tables." 

]^ut he cannot sustain the jesting mood; and he feels, 
too, that it is a wrong to his friend, for he straightway 
adds, also addressing him — 

"Would I had met my dearest foe in heaven. 
Or ever I had seen that dav. Horatio!" 



HAMLET. 421 



Again lie gives himself up to meditation^ and gazes 
with the ^^ mind's eye'' into the invisible world where 
the spirit of his father dwells. When roused by the 
account of the apparition^ his habitual mental activity is 
suspended in wonder : there is neither argument nor 
skeptical distrust^ but only the firm resolve to speak to 
the spectre^ if it assume his noble father's person^ with 
the prudential injunction of secresy upon all who had 
witnessed the mystery. When left alone, the habit of 
meditation returns and associates the strange intelligence 
with some of his own unuttered presentiments. 

The ghost of the murdered monarch is surely one of 
the most majestic phantoms that poetic imagination has 
ever realized. It is an apparition not so much of terror 
as of awe and solemnity, arrayed with all the impressive 
associations of the grave, of religion, and of popular su- 
perstition. Its movements are stately — the shadow, as it 
were, of the step of a kingly soldier; the glory of its 
earthly and warlike majesty is mysteriously mingled with 
an awful dignity brought from the regions of the dead. 
It is that fair and warlike form 

"In which the majesty of buried Denmark 
Did sometimes march." 

It seems to wear the very armour he had on 

" When he the ambitious Norway combated." 

When the soldiers vainly and rashly strike at it with 
their partisans, they straightway feel — 

"We do it wrong, being so majestical, 
To oflFer it the show of violence ; 
For it is, as the air, invulnerable, 
And our vain blows malicious mockery." 



422 Li:CTUUE THIRD. 



The spectre wliicli most nearly resembles it is the impe- 
rial apparition of Caesar, wliich awed even the philosophic 
soul of Brutus before the battle of Philippi. 

Now, let us consider how the young philosophy of 
Hamlet will bear, this new and supernatural influence. 
His presence of mind never forsakes him ; for, with all 
the emotion and amazement and the solemn awe which 
agitate him^ he addresses the phantom of his father with 
apt questionings : when his attendants become fearfully 
apprehensive that he may be led away to his destruction, 
it seems to me that there is a moral sublimity in Hamlet's 
brief argument for fearlessness — a spiritual fearlessness ; 
and again in the calm expression of his determination, 
unheeding Horatio's effort to alarm him: 

" Why, what should be the fear ? 
I do not set my life at a pin's fee; 
And, for my soul, what can it do to that, 
Being a thing immortal as itself?" 

While the ghost speaks, Hamlet's mind is riveted in 
dutiful attention to words which show his dark misgivings, 
more than realized in the mysterious disclosure. But 
the after consequences of such a supernatural visitation 
are yet greater. In the records of ghost stories, it is said 
that, ^^ whenever the supernatural character of the appari- 
tion has been believed, the effects on the spectator have 
always been most terrible — convulsion, idiocy, madness, 
or even death, on the s-pot."* 

The vanishing of the ghost, whose presence had awed 
Hamlet into a reverential silence, is followed by a burst 
of language which shows that his intellect is in a state of 

* Coleridge's Table Talk; p. 22. 



HAMLET. 423 

delirious commotion; and the first sign of the disturbance 
of it has been discovered in the vow '^ to wipe away from 
the table of his memory, all trivial fond records, all saws 
of books, all forms, all pressures past, that youth and ob- 
servation copied there -y' and then, at the very instant, 
writing down in his tablets the maxim 

" That one may smile, and smile, and be a villain ! 
At least, I am sure, it may be so in Denmark." 

When his friends rejoin him, the intense excitement of 
his mind gives way to eccentric jesting. He puts them 
away from himself and his secret with what seems a 
strange flippancy — "wild and whirling words,' ^ as Horatio 
calls them. As the tumult of his emotions subsides, his 
gentle, gentlemanly disposition prompts an apology to 
Horatio for what looked too like an unworthy trifling 
with him. The wonted activity of his intellect again 
appears in what has struck me as the most graceful and 
thoughtful play upon words I have ever met with. It 
occurs immediately before the half-sportive allusion to 
the philosophical studies of himself and his fellow-stu- 
dent. When the ghost is heard speaking from beneath, 
Horatio exclaims — 

" Oh, day and night but this is wondrous strange ! 

Hamlet. And therefore as a stranger give it welcome. 
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, 
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy," 

Happy would it be, let me add, if, whenever a spiritual 
mystery is presented to our thoughts, we did not reject it 
because, transcending our little knowledge, it happens to 
be "undreamt of in our philosophy ;'' tappy would it 
be if we did not suff"er doubts, and suspicions, and the 



424 LECTURE THIRD. 



sophistries of a sensualized skepticism to shut up the 
avenues of our souls, instead of opening the door wide to 
give the mystery a stranger's welcome ! 

Hamlet's character from the time of the interview 
with the ghost becomes more complicated ;* and it is a 
question on which a great deal of comment has been ex- 
pended, whether his insanity is feigned or real. The 
difficulties involving the question are of theoretical rather 
than of practical purport ; for they do not seem to affect 
the poetical impression which the character is intended 
to make. Indeed, it may be that the interest of the cha- 
racter is rather increased by this very mysteriousness — 
the obscurity in discriminating between his affected wild- 
ness and the actual disturbance of his intellect. These 
difficulties are owing partly to this — that insanity is of so 
many degrees, and so multiform, that you can scarce de- 
fine it : the English language, though not highly esteemed 
by all for its copiousness, furnishes, it may be, a dozen 
different words to express the various morbid conditions 
of the intellect. I, probably, am not wrong in saying 
that this subject of insanity has often perplexed at least 
two learned professions, to say nothing of the wisdom of 
judges and the integrity of jurors. To some charitable 
minds, enormity of crime is itself an evidence of insanity 
— of a wrong head as well as a wrong heart; while by 
others, of sterner judgments, a disordered intellect would 
not be suffered to plead insanity in bar of justice at an 
earthly tribunal. Modern philanthropy and science have 
learnt to classify, for salutary purposes, the inmates of 
lunatic asylums ; but no science has ever attempted the 
same process for the unhealthy minds that share with the 
sane ones the business of life. 



HAMLET. 425 



The difficulty with respect to Hamlet is not so much 
in forming a just conception of the state of his mind, as 
in attaching a precise significancy to this word '^ insanity/^ 
At least there need be no such difficulty, were it not 
oftener caused by the logic of a contracted criticism — the 
propensity to narrow verbal comment — which will misap- 
prehend the whole drift of a character and destroy the 
spirit of a drama by dwelling upon detached passages and 
expressions. 

This is fatal to a true appreciation of the dramatic 
genius of the poet : very much, if I may be allowed to 
use such an illustration, which I do with entire reve- 
rence, — very much in the same way that men often per- 
plex and embarrass their faith — argue it out of their 
hearts, and tempt themselves into miserable heresies by 
fastening upon isolated texts, instead of studying the 
Scriptures with a more docile and catholic spirit than 
that which trusts to mere logic. 

Hamlet mentions to his friends a deliberate purpose of 
"putting an antic disposition on," and he is seen fulfilling 
his intention ; and hence it is inferred that all his insa- 
nity is feigned. On the other hand, there is observed a 
wildness of demeanour which cannot thus be accounted 
for; and hence it is inferred that it is real insanity. 
Now, the human mind is not such a simple machine as 
this, and Shakspeare knew it too well ever to treat it so. 
The truth, as well as I can state a matter so abstruse. 
seems to be this : that, from a combination of influences, 
the mind of Hamlet was in a state of undue susceptibility 
of both unnatural excitement and depression ; and then 
further agitated by a supernatural visitation, by which, in 
his own words, he felt his " disposition horridly shaken 



426 LECTURE THIRD. 



with ttouglits beyond the reaches of our souls." This 
visible and audible communion with the dead has so con- 
vulsed all the spiritual elements of hfs nature, that he 
becomes conscious that the sovereignty of his reason is in 
jeopardy; and it is this very consciousness — the appre- 
hension of insanity — which suggests to an intellect so 
active the thought of feigning madness — the device of 
assuming an antic disposition — which would give him an 
unwonted freedom, and which might always be controlled 
by his habitual intellectual strength. It comes, then, to 
this — that there was disorder in the mind — a disturbance 
of his intellect, something more than that which he was 
feigning; but, if this question of insanity involve the 
question whether his mind ceased to be under the mas- 
tery of his will, assuredly there was no such aberration. 

In the various allusions to the condition of Hamlet's 
mind, you may find it variously designated. The queen 
tenderly speaks of the '' transformation" of her son. The 
king speaks of it as a "melancholy^ and a "distemper." 
Polonius calls it "lunacy." The grave-digger bluntly 
taks of "Hamlet — ^he that is mad and sent to England; 
sent there because he was mad ; he shall recover his wits 
there ; or if he do nqt, it is no great matter ; it will not 
be seen in him there ; there the men are as mad as he." 
But when Ophelia speaks of it, in the simplicity of her 
opinion, there is not only beauty but truth in the image 
by which she describes what seems to her the piteous 
overthrow of a lofty mind : 

" See that noble and most sovereign reason, 
Like sweet bells jangled, out of tune, and harsh." 

It is an exquisite similitude of the undefinable condition 



HAMLET. 427 



of Hamlet's mind : his intellect liad lost its harmony^ but 
still there was a wild music in the changes' which an un- 
toward destiny was ringing on it. 

The scene with Ophelia is one of the most difficult to 
interpret. There is a natural inclination to refer to real 
insanity Hamlet's apparent harshness ; for there seems to 
be a rude rejecting of her, which it is hard to reconcile 
with the truth and gentleness of his natural disposition, 
and which we cannot quite believe his deep love for her 
would suffer him to affect. But it must be remembered, 
that there was a leave-taking before this, which is not 
dramatically presenied, and which, in some respects, is 
more important. It is only described: it was a silent 
interview — that silence a better token of his deep feeling 
than the wild words he afterwards addresses to her. He 
takes her by the hand ; he gazes on her face with 

" Sucli perusal as he would draw it/' — 

perhaps to impress it on his imagination as something 
dear to his heart, and yet which an awful necessity forces 
him to banish. A deep and piteous sigh breaks from 
him ; then, without a word spoken, he leaves her — 

"That done, he lets me go. 
And, with his head over his shoulder turned, 
He seem'd to find his way without his eyes ; 
For out o' doors he went without their helps. 
And, to the last, bended their light on me." 

This was the real leave-taking ; and if it be asked why 
he thus alienated himself from Ophelia, the necessity is 
to be explained by the fearful responsibility which filled 
his soul. A voice from the srave was ever in his ears. 



428 LECTURE THIRD. 



The apparition of a loved and honoured father had burst 
from the prison-house of the dead to lay upon the soul 
of Hamletj with supernatural weight, a duty which he 
felt must absorb his being. What now could he have to 
do with such a sentiment as love ? With all its purity, 
it could not consort with his solemn charge. 

When afterwards Hamlet unexpectedly finds himself 
again in the presence of Ophelia, all his former affection 
comes back upon him : 

" Soft you, now ! 
The fair Ophelia ! — Nymph, in thy orisons 
Be all my sins remember'd." 

He had over-calculated his own strength in setting aside 
his love for her ; and of this he becomes conscious when 
the thought of his one paramount duty quickly returns. 
Hence, the revulsion of feeling in this painful scene — the 
desperate energy with which he recovers himself from 
relapse into an affection, the indulgence of which his des- 
tiny can no more admit. His apparent rudeness we must 
not take too literally — remember it is poetry, and not 
prose, we are studying now. It is not in reality indiffer- 
ence and heartlessness to Ophelia, but self-reproach of 
what he sternly condemns as his own weakness, when, 
with such strange impetuosity, he bids her — " To a nun- 
nery, go" — one moment disclaiming his love, and another 
acknowledging it — "^ith a wild irony accusing himself of 
^^ pride, revenge, ambition — more offences at his beck 
than he has thoughts to put them in, imagination to give 
them shape, or time to act them in;" then telling the 
innocent and artless girl of the vices and frailties, not, 
indeed, of herself, but of her sex, and warning her that 



HAMLET. 429 



the world is not a safe place for her to abide in : — ^^ Get 
thee to a nunnery, farewell. . . . To a nunnery, go; 
and quickly too. Farewell. . . . To a nunnery, go.'' 
In confirmation of the view I have taken of this scene, 
observe that Hamlet's asperity does not wound Ophelia 
as an injury. Her only feeling is pity — more for the sad 
calamity of his intellect than for her own dejected hope- 
lessness. 

Meditative as is the mind of Hamlet, his nature is too 
gentle for him to travel on in life a solitary-hearted man. 
The sense of loneliness is relieved by his friendship for 
Horatio, to whose manly judgment he could, in consulta- 
tion, impart his supernatural secret and his dread, though 
ill-defined, purposes, which it would have been both cruel 
and useless to tell to one so innocent, so tender, and so 
artless as the ^^ sweet Ophelia.'' The friendship of 
Hamlet and Horatio is one of those — such as may be ob- 
served in actual life — founded not only upon sympathies, 
but upon harmonious contrasts of character — the qualities 
of one party happily felt as supplying something wanting 
in the other, Horatio is a man not only of strong, but 
just and well-regulated, feelings, and especially in intel- 
lectual constitution, possessed of sound, practical, common 
sense, strikingly contrasted with Hamlet's imaginative 
apprehensiveness — the deep spirit of meditation and over- 
wrought mental activity. The character of Hamlet is 
overflowing with poetry and philosophy, while Horatio is 
matter-of-fact and prosaic. Yet, in this very variety, 
Hamlet, conscious of his own disposition, feels that he 
has a better friend — a safer counsellor. 

Besides this friendship, Hamlet finds relief from the 
sense of moral desolation, which sickens his heart, in the 



430 LECTURE THIRD. 



conscious power of his intellect. It is this, I think, 
which may explain the abrupt transition from an expres- 
sion of his dreary feeling to that splendid panegyric upon 
man : — ^^I have of late (but wherefore I know not) lost all 
my mirth, foregone all custom of exercises ; and, indeed, 
it goes so heavily with my disposition, that this goodly 
frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory; this 
most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave over- 
hanging firmament, this majestical roof, fretted with 
golden fire — why, it appears no other thing to me than a 
foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. What a piece 
of work is a man ! How noble in reason ! how infinite in 
faculty ! in form, and moving, how express and admira- 
ble ! in action, how like an angel ! in apprehension, how 
like a god ! the beauty of the world ! the paragon of ani- 
mals ! And yet, to me, what is this quintessence of 
dustr^ 

The genius of Hamlet is shown not only in such pas- 
sages interspersed through the ramblings of his antic dis- 
position, but also in his inimitable lonely meditations, 
such as that most famous of all soliloquies, when, stand- 
ing on the fancied brink of life — the very tide-mark of 
-' this bank and shoal of time'' — he gazes out upon the 
ocean of eternity, his 

*' Soul has sight of that immortal sea, 
Which brought us hither."* 

His ^' mind's eye" is strained almost to blindness in the 
efibrt to descry the shores of " that undiscovered country 
from whose bourne no traveller returns :" and his spirit 

* Wordsworth's Ode on the Intimations of Immortality. 



HAMLET. 431 



falls back again to this earthly life^ saddened by thoughts 
of prosperous iniquity and by his sympathy with suffering 
humanity, the vision of its wrongs and miseries before 
"this mortal coil is shuffled off" — 

" The spurns, 
That patient merit of the unworthy takes." 

Hamlet's far-reachins; mind seeks to fathom the dreams 
of our afterlife. Indeed, as Charles Lamb, speaking of 
the impossibility of acting this tragedy, remarks — " Nine 
parts in ten of what Hamlet does are transactions between 
himself and his moral sense — effusions of his solitary 
musings, which he retires to holes and corners and the 
most sequestered parts of the palace to pour forth; or 
rather, they are the silent meditations with which his 
bosom is bursting, reduced to words for the sake of the 
reader — profound sorrows — light-and-noise-abhorring ru- 
minations, which the tongue scarce dares utter to deaf 
walls and chambers.''"^ 

But the mandate of his father's spirit is not yet ful- 
filled. The usurper is still on the throne — the incestuous 
marriage is unbroken. Why is this with one who, at the 
first intimation given by the ghost, spoke of " sweeping 
to his revenge with wings as swift as meditation or the 
thoughts of love'' ? The chief explanation by the best 
critics lies in the excessive activity of Hamlet's intellect 
— disproportionate mental exertion, always busy with its 
own suggestions and speculations, but flying from the 
acting point. He is consc^'ous of this himself in some of 
his self-reproaches : 

* Essay on Shakspeare's Tragedies. Prose Works, vol. i. p. 107. 



432 LECTURE THIRD. 



" What is a man, 
If his chief good, and market of his time, 
Be but to sleep and feed? a beast, no more. 
Sure he that made us with such large discourse, 
Looking before and after, gave us not 
That capability and godlike reason 
To fust in us unused. Now, whether it be 
Bestial oblivion, or some craven scruple 
Of thinking too precisely on the event, — 
A thought, which quarter'd, hath but one part wisdom, 
And ever three parts coward, — I do not know 
Why yet I live to say, * This thing's to do;' 
Sith I have cause, and will, and strength, and means, 
To do't." 

But tHs is the exaggeration of self-accusation. Hamlet 
was brave, yet lie was gentle too ; and it seems to me 
tliat another and, perhaps, chief cause of his inaction, 
for which sufficient allowance has not been made, was 
the tenderness of his conscience — the agitation of the 
moral sense even more than of the intellect : 

''Thus conscience docs make cowards of us all; 
And thus the native hue of resolution 
Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought; 
And enterprises of great pith and moment. 
With this regard, their currents turn awry 
And lose the name of action." 

It should not be forgotten that when the ghost imposed 
on Hamlet the duty of vengeance, he said not how, but 
solemnly charged him — 

" Howsoever thou pursu'st this act. 
Taint not thy mind, nor let thy soul contrive 
Against thy mother aught." 

It was the awful duty of blood-shedding to be discharged 



IIAMLET 433 

righteously, and most natural was it that the duty was 
entangled in inextricable perplexity. 

The tenderness of Hamlet's conscience is shown in his 
repenting of the chance-killing of Polonius ; and after- 
wards when, eluding the treachery of Rosencrantz and 
Guildenstern, he sends them to the death they had 
plotted for him, he makes some little excusing of him^ 
self to Horatio : 

"Why, man, they did make love to this employment; 
They are not near my conscience." 

And then the thought of putting the king to death 
comes to his mind with a sense of justice — an act of 
dutiful vengeance : 

"Is't not perfect conscience 
To quit him with this arm ?" 

It is his moral doubts which have blunted his purpose — 
postponing — 

" The important acting of the dread command." 

These caused his misgivings that the spectre might be an 
evil spirit, seeking out his weakness and his melancholy 
to abuse him to his perdition. He sought, therefore, fur- 
ther assurance of his conscience by means of the play 
before the king, saying that if his occulted guilt did not 
there unkennel itself — 

" It is a damned ghost that we have seen, 
And my imaginations are as foul 
As Vulcan's stitlty." 

When once Hamlet has actually drawn his sword to take 

28 



434 LECTURE THIRD. 



the forfeit life of the usurper, he sheathes it again for an 
expressed reason that sounds almost like a fiendish ven- 
geance — the thought that if the king were killed while 
praying, his soul, purged and seasoned for the passage, 
would go to heaven. But surely no one can misappre- 
hend this for the true reason : — it is only a piece of 
self-deception — an excuse for delay — a palliation for his 
shrinking from a deed of blood. The soliloquy of the 
king is the portraiture of a wretched man clinging to his 
guilt, and therefore helpless in his strivings after contri- 
tion. Touching the subjects of mercy and expiation and 
prayer, it contains one of those vailed and profoundly 
reverential allusions to Scripture truths and language, 
which Shakspeare occasionally shadows forth with such 
a pious reserve : 

"What, if this cursed hand 
Were thicker than itself with brother's blood ? 
Is there not rain enough in the sweet heavens, 
To wash it white as snow ? Y/hereto serves mercy, 
But to confront the visage of offence ? 
And what's in prayer, but this twofold force, — 
To be forestalled, ere we come to fall, 
Or pardon'd, being down ?" 

As the play draws to a close, Hamlet seems rather to 
recede from his purpose than to approach it. It has 
been truly said of him that he is always perfectly equal 
to any call of the moment, let it only not be for the fu- 
ture.* He is sent from the kingdom, nothing yet accom- 
plished. Perhaps his absence was to spare him the sad 



* Coleridge's Literary Remains, (Notes on Hamlet,) vol. ii. p. 229. 
(Ed. 1836.) 



H A M L E T. 435 



catastrophe of Ophelia's insanity, of which he was the 
innocent cause. The love he had been forced by higher 
duties to relinquish, would have come back to her forlorn 
estate : it did come back at her grave : 

"I loved Ophelia; forty thousand brothers 
Could not, with all their quantity of love, 
Make up my sum." 

A most attractive grace continues to be thrown round 
every movement of Hamlet — spiritual, intellectual, and 
bodily, in the closing scenes of the tragedy — the thought- 
ful, playful conversation with the grave-digger, and the 
gentle moralizing over the relics of mortality — the gen- 
tlemanly sporting with the fop — the more than gentle- 
manly apology to Laertes : 

'^ Give me your pardon, sir : I have done you wrong : 
But pardon it, as you are a gentleman. 
This presence knows, and you must needs have heard, 
How I am punish'd with a sore distraction. 
What I have done. 

That might your nature, honour, and exception 
Roughly awake, I here proclaim was madness. 
« -;;:- * * 

Sir, in this audience. 
Let my disclaiming from a purposed evil 
Pree me so far in your most generous thoughts, 
That I have shot my arrow o'er the house. 
And hurt my brother." 

One of the latest expressions of Hamlet's habits /'i 
thoughtfulness is the beautiful presentiment of his ap- 
proaching death, when, speaking to Horatio with som»? 
conj&dence of success in the fencing-match, he adds — 
"But thou would'st not think how ill all's here abouf. 



436 LECTURE THIRD. 



my heart: but it's no matter."* This gloominess alarms 
his friend, and Hamlet tries to shake it off: — "It is 
but foolery; but it is such a kind of gain-giving as 
would, perhaps, trouble a woman/^ Horatio still urges 
him to postpone the trial at arms, because he is not 
fit ; but Hamlet speaks in a better mood of faith : — " Not 
a whit, we defy augury ; there's a special providence in 
the fall of a sparrow." 

He whose mind had been so active in its purposes — 
whose heart had beat so quickly to all true impulses 
— achieves the duty, vaguely commanded by a super- 
natural voice, only by co-operating with the tumult of 
an accident, and in the heat of passion. Heretofore, 
always equal to the present moment, his meditations 
— meditations of the h^art as well as of the intellect — 
had perpetually carri-^d him into the distant future. 
Now, the certainty of the poison crowds all the future 
of his mortal life into a few, short, present instants. 
Death is in Denmark's palace. The majestic phantom 
of him who once tenanted the throne, is avenged by 
the bloody perishing of the guilty. The innocent one 
is implicated ^oo deeply in the destiny of the tragedy 
to escape, and Horatio's words are his fitting requiem : 

"Now cracks a noble heart. Good-night, sweet prince j 
And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest."f 

* Coleridge's Literary Remains, (Notes on Hamlet,) vol. ii. p. 234. 

f On my brother's manuscript, I find a reference to what he de- 
scribes as some excellent criticism on Hamlet in the Christian Re- 
membrancer for January, 1S49, in an article on the book of Job; 
and in a private letter written just as he was fresh from the composi- 
tion of this lecture, he says : — "I have never felt myself so deeply in 
the heart of Hamlet — my insight into the character clearer than ever 
before had oeen giveh to me." W. B. R. 



LECTURE IV * 

In closing my last lecture, I spoke of the subject of 
this evening's lecture as the deepest of Shakspeare's tra- 
gedies. The first impression might be different; for, 
through the scenes of Othello, there are scattered things 
which seem to belong to comedy — the pliability of that 
poor dupe, Roderigo — the sarcastic jests of lago and his 
drinking songs, and the tipsiness of Cassio. These are 
matters which might befit the comic drama, but they are 
subordinate to what is, I repeat, the deepest of Shak- 
speare's tragedies. Perhaps, therefore, it is the most 
remarkable illustration of the power of our great dramatic 
poet's imagination in blending together, in apt propor- 
tions, the tragic and the comic elements — just as in real 
life you may often find, near each other, things to weep 
for, and things to smile, or it may be even to laugh, at. 
The tragedy of Othello is the deepest, because in it the 
darkest and lowest region of human wickedness is brought 
to light, because the victim of that wickedness is a most 
heroic heart, and because, most of all, a being the purest, 



* December 27tb, 1842. 

437 



438 L K C T U R E F U R T II. 



most innocent, and gentle, is made the sacrifice. It 
must be very deep when you reflect that in it are com- 
bined the destinies of lago and Othello and Desdemona. 
Never did poetic creation dive into a cayern so deep, so 
dark and noisome as the soul of lago; never did poet's 
imagination kindle a fiercer fire than flamed from the 
heart of the frenzied Moor; never did it shine upon a 
spot so beautiful, so fair, as that loving, meek, and faith- 
ful Yenetian lady. It is the deepest tragedy, because 
there is in its course of events less to reconcile the heart 
to its dismal ending, less to make us willingly, though 
wofully, acquiesce in the unmerited suffering of the inno- 
cent; and, therefore, it is only by justly and strongly 
conceiving the essential idea of pure tragedy that we can 
be brought to believe that such a catastrophe was right. 

In the tragedy of Othello, the master-spirit is at once 
set before us — the wicked one who rules the destinies of 
all on whom he casts his evil eye. Amid the various 
forms in which the shaping imagination of the poet has 
fashioned his conceptions of human wickedness, lago is 
pre-eminent — the most vicious — the most viciously power- 
ful of all the Shaksperean villains. There is a force of 
intellect in the character which, divorced as it is from 
every thing like moral sentiment, is fearful to contem- 
plate. It has the excessive intellectual activity which 
we had occasion to study in Hamlet, but not, as in that 
sweet prince, gently wedded to virtuous meditation and 
kindly sympathies. The consciousness of mental energy 
in Hamlet spent itself in pure and perpetual musings ; 
while in lago it delights in annihilating the peace of 
mind in his happy fellow-beings. There is something of 
the reflectiveness of 3Iacbeth, but none of his natural 



OTHELLO. 439 



tenderness of disposition — none of his apprehensive ima- 
gination — none of his fluttering, procrastinating con- 
science, which needed the outward impulses of a super- 
natural temptation, and the strong sway of a strong-willed 
woman to drive him on to guilt. lago is all-sufficient to 
himself. He originates his own plans of mischief; he 
counsels with no one 3 he needs no help, unless it be for 
so insignificant a service as to steal a handkerchief, and 
then he bids his wife perpetrate the theft. Not altoge- 
ther passionless, his passions are at the absolute command 
of his intellect : he can, at will, be calm or choleric. 
Listen as closely as you may, you cannot hear his heart 
beat. He is one of your stony-hearted philosophers — 

" A reasoning, self-sufficient thing, 
An intellectual all-in-all."* 

He knows where his strength lies, and it is his delight to 
use it ; for he plots and intrigues and destroys. 

One curious evidence of the power of this character is 
to be observed in the fact, that the reader himself is often 
deluded by lago's sophistries and falsehood, so artfully 
does he misrepresent them — so vehemently does he vilify. 
Por instance, speaking of Desdemona, he says to Rode- 
rigo — " Mark me with what violence she first loved the 
Moor, but for bragging and telling her fantastical lies !" 
And not only does this coarse and vulgar perversion of 
Othello's defence before the senate of his course of love 
win the weak belief of lago's dupe, but the reader him- 
self is half disposed to accredit it. Now, it must be 
remembered that Shakspeare, above all poets, >s distin- 

"-'■ Woi-dsworth's Poet's Epitaph. 



440 LECTURE FOURTH. 



guislied for this — that he never explains his characters ; 
he creates them, sets them before us in speech and 
action, and then leaves it to us to find them out — ^just as 
in real life we have to study the characters and tempers 
of actual men and women, and often without rightly 
knowing them. It is this which most demonstrates the 
poet's vivid imagination — the intensity of his creative 
power: it is this which constitutes the self-forgetting 
intrepidity of the genuine artist, disdaining to be his own 
commentator, and trusting that some faithful heart will 
rise from the reverential lowliness of genuine criticism to 
a just knowledge of his creations. For this confidence 
we make but a poor return when we interpret a poet's 
words as literally as the argumentation of prose, and un- 
imaginatively accept for truth the speech that falls from 
even a villain's tongue. The poems of Shakspeare are 
dramas, and, therefore, we must not read them as if they 
were narratives. They are the action, and not the story, 
of human virtues and vices and passions ; and so true to 
nature are the creations of his genius, that, living mor- 
tals, they may be found saying a hundred things in 
which they are themselves deceived, or in which they 
would wilfully deceive others. In the study of cha- 
racter, as dramatically portrayed, there can be no more 
fniitful source of error than to take detached passages 
without heed to the character of him who speaks. Now, 
in the tragedy of Othello, unless you carefully adopt this 
principle as a safeguard, you have to deal with so adroit 
a villain, so accomplished a sophist, so reckless and insi- 
dious a liar in lago, that he will surely deceive you. No 
word of his is to be taken on trust — for he owns no obliga- 
tion to truth, and is instantaneously rapid in fabrication. 



OTHELLO. 441 



It is to this prodigious talent for deception which cha- 
racterizes lago that may, I think, be traced an erroneous 
view in regard to the very germ of the tragedy. It seems 
to be generally assumed, that lago's hatred of Othello had 
its origin in military disappointment — professional pique 
at Cassio's promotion in preference to him; and that, 
therefore, this frustrated ambition left behind it the sting 
of a determined revenge. According to this view, all the 
tragic consequences followed from lago's spirit of ven- 
geance ; and I do not know but what there is thus in- 
sinuated into our minds some secret sympathy with him 
as an injured man — an approved soldier unfairly dealt 
with — his services forgotten in the favouritism to a 
new soldier — 

" Forsooth, a great arithmetician, 
One Michael Cassio, a Florentine." 

Now, what is the proof of all this ? Nothing, from first 
scene to last, I believe, but lago's word. He says so, 
and therefore it is true, when surely the safer logic would 
be, that therefore it is false. General as the interpreta- 
tion has been, that military disappointment was the cause 
of lago's animosity against the Moorish chief, I am well 
persuaded there is nothing to sanction it. I do not be- 
lieve a word of the story. There is nothing in the inter- 
course between Othello and lago and Cassio which looks 
like it; and, indeed, such an injury was of itself hardly 
of the kind to imbitter the feelings of such a being as 
lago. 

But this fiction has found more ready belief from 
another cause ; and that is, the notion that such extre- 
mity of wickedness as his is unnatural— that there is not 



442 LECTURE FOURTH. 



adequate cause for his hatred of Othello, and the havoc 
he makes of his happiness. The most has therefore been 
made of this military disappointment, because critics and 
readers have assumed to think, that otherwise there would 
be nothing for the superstructure of the tragedy to rest 
upon. It would be much better if the critic always ap- 
proached these dramas with a more docile temper, and 
not with the presumptuous vanity of helping Shakspeare 
in his interpretations of what is natural. But the great 
poet-philosopher did not handle his subjects thus timidly. 
He was no dainty moralist; and in this tragedy it was his 
purpose to realize one of the most fearful speculations 
respecting human nature — to show one of the darkest 
sides of the soul of man — that it is capable of " motive 
less malignity.^' This is Coleridge's fit phrase in the 
description of lago's villainy.* At least, the incidents 
which chance to suggest his malignant feelings are so 
immeasurably disproportionate, that they can scarce be 
spoken of as causes or motives. In some .cases it is 
clearly apparent, that lago's reasons are afterthoughts 
— faint recognitions of the difference between right 
and wrong — opiates to quiet the few, irregular, and very 
feeble beatings of a conscience not quite dead. The ex- 
planations of his hatred of Othello are not to be credu- 
lously received as realities, but to be withstood as the 
fictions of a quick invention and a wicked spirit — foul 
things engendered in the pollutions of his heart. 

In the science of human nature, it is a fearful truth 
that there is a temptation to crime in the mere gratifica- 
tion of a pleasurable consciousness of power; that the 

* Literary Remains, vol. a. p. 260. (Notes on Othello.) 



OTHELLO. 443 



mind is tempted to dwell upon guilty which, thus being 
taken up into the thoughts, becomes familiar, and then 
takes possession of our actions. This is the peril of a foul 
imagination, such as la go's. It is shallow philosophy to 
look for outward, instead of inward, motive ; and most un- 
satisfactory is it to be told that the motive to all the 
misery which lago worked out was no more than a disap- 
pointment in promotion. Such a solution seems only the 
more to perplex the problem ; for, if we must seek for an 
outward motive, this is, indeed, most insufficient. The 
true motive was the innate malignity of lago's heart — the 
natural antagonism of a base to a noble nature. In this 
tragedy, Shakspeare has represented one of the most insi- 
dious and mysterious temptations that the spirit of man 
is exposed to — a temptation which, when it triumphs, 
seems to assimilate humanity, even in its mortal life, to 
the desperate state of demons. It is the pride of power 
in its most depraved form : proud of its wicked inven- 
tions, and then proud of the conscious strength to achieve 
them. Perhaps we might in this way trace to its source 
that strange influence — the contagion or fascination of 
crime. Some act of depravity is committed, then told in 
all its appalling details ; and, when the public mind be- 
comes thoroughly familiar with the thoughts and emotions 
thus prompted, a hundred hearts, roused from their sleep 
of innocence, are impelled, by what almost seems a super- 
natural influence, to perpetrate their wicked imaginations. 
The records of crime bear witness to this horrid truth : 
they show that this mysterious path does exist among the 
thousand avenues, which the powers of evil have opened, 
to tempt the soul of man downward. I do not know that 
philosophy has done much to explain how the will of man 



444 LECTURE FOURTH. 



is led to this aberration, but there is something analogous 
to it, and by which, perhaps, it may be illustrated, in an 
emotion which, probably, has been experienced by most 
persons — I allude to that singular feeling or impulse, or 
whatever it may be called, which, on looking down from 
the edge of any great elevation, seems to be almost a wish 
to cast oneself into the depth below, and which comes so 
strongly on some, that they shrink, shuddering, from the 
spot of danger. This sensation has been described by 
Shakspeare, with one of his inimitable phrases, in a well- 
known passage in Hamlet : 

*' The very place puts toys of desperation, 
Without more motive, into every brain, 
That looks so many fathoms to the sea. 
And hears it roar beneath." 

In like manner the contemplation of crime — the looking 
down into its deep, dark moral gulf, strangely puts '^toys 
of desperation'^ in the brain of him who suffers his 
thoughts and imaginings to dwell too familiarly with 
guilt. lago's intellect is habitually busy with the evil 
suggestions of intense selfishness and native malignity; 
and his is a strong and active intellect, every movement 
of which brings along with it a sense of power ; and then 
the inevitable, irresistible, onward course of iniquity is to 
put these wicked conceptions into action. 

The first movement of the tragedy and of the wicked 
elements of lago's disposition, seems to be simply this : 
during an interval of military service, he has insinuated 
himself into a kind of friendship with a rich young Vene- 
tian, whom he flatters with professions of assistance in 
gaining the hand of Desdemona. lago is a soldier — a 



OTHELLO. 445 



man of adventure ; and he has gained an ascendancy over 
Roderigo for the meanly selfish purpose of using his 
purse. This mercenary motive, cast in the rank soil of 
lago's heart, is the single seed from which springs the 
harvest of all his atrocity. Unexpectedly, it is discovered 
that Othello has proved a successful rival in Desdemona's 
love, and lago finds it necessary to confirm the assurances 
he has given of his hatred towards Othello; and then 
comes the fiction, as I believe it to be, of the wrong done 
to him by Cassio's promotion. There is on the part of 
Roderigo an almost immeasurable inferiority of intellect 
to his companion, but this very inferiority serves an im- 
portant dramatic purpose, because thus lago's character 
is the better developed by his bolder dealings with his 
dupe. Well assured of his intellectual supremacy, which 
there was neither force of mind nor of morals to with- 
stand, lago knows that he is sure of deference to mere 
power of intellect, even although displayed in a reckless 
avowal of an absolute want of principle and honour. So 
completely is Roderigo in his grasp — so absolutely subject 
to the stronger mind — that lago talks to him almost as 
unreservedly as in soliloquy. There is no one to whom 
he speaks so freely, so fully; no one, indeed, to whom he 
could have ventured so to open the dark and hollow 
places of his heart. It is apparently from the pleasure- 
able consciousness of his abundant power of intellect, 
rather than from the necessity of it, that he goes on argu- 
ing and philosophizing with his dupe ; and so mighty is 
the fascination, that Roderigo scarcely flutters under it — 
he is lost in amazement and admiration at the boldness 
with which honesty is scoffed at, and the pride of intel- 
lectual strength proclaimed. When Roderigo expresses 



446 LECTURE FOURTH. 



surprise at lago's reconciling his hatred and service to 
Othello, he is overwhelmed with the answer — 

" sir, content you : 
I follow him to serve my turn upon him : 
We cannot all be masters, nor all masters 
Cannot be truly follow'd. You shall mark 
Many a duteous and knee-crooking knave, 
That, doting on his own obsequious bondage. 
Wears out his time, much like his master's ass. 
For nought but provender; and when he's old, cashier'd: 
Whip me such honest knaves. Others there are. 
Who, trimm'd in forms and visages of duty. 
Keep yet their hearts attending on themselves; 
And, throwing but shows of service on their lords, 
Do well thrive by them ; and, when they have lined their coats. 
Do themselves homage : these fellows have some soul; 
And such a one do I profess myself. 
For, sir. 

It is as sure as you are Roderigo, 
Were I the Moor, I would not be lago. 
In following him, I foUow but myself: 
Heaven is my judge, not I for love and duty. 
But seeming so, for my peculiar end : 
For when my outward action doth demonstrate 
The native act and figure of my heart 
In compliment extern, 'tis not long after. 
But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve. 
For daws to peck at : I am not what I am." 

And when he has thus made sure of Roderigo's absolute 
submissiveness, observe with what decision he bids him, 
us to his course against Othello, 

" Make after him, poison his delight ; 
Proclaim him in the streets ; incense her kinsmen. 
And, though he in a fertile climate dwell. 
Plague him with flies: though that his joy be joy. 
Yet throw such changes of vexation on't. 
As it may lose some colour." 



OTHELLO. 447 



lago is soon after found by the side of his noble victim. 
He tells Othello of Roderigo's slanders ; and, with blunt 
professions of love and loyalty, he says how hard it was 
to refrain from resenting it by stabbing the slanderer — 
and the calm, placid heroism of the Moor is shown 
in the simple reply — 

*' 'Tis better as it is." 

All attempts to excite or intimidate him are equally inef- 
fectual ; for there is an imperturbable dignity when he 
intimates his lofty birth, his services to the state, and his 
devotion to a soldier's life, as sufficient security against 
the angry father's complaints : 

" Let him do his spite : 
My services, which I have done the seigniory, 
Shall out-tongue his complaints. 'Tis yet to know, 
("Which, when I know that boasting is an honour, 
I shall promulgate,) I fetch my life and being 
From men of royal siege ; and my demerits 
May speak, unbonneted, to as proud a fortune 
As this that I have reach'd. For know, lago. 
But that I love the gentle Desdemona, 
I would not my unhoused free condition 
Put into circumscription and confine 
For the sea's worth." 

When urged by lago to retire, the same majestic compo- 
sure is in his answer : 

" Not I : I must be found ; 
My parts, my title, and my perfect soul 
Shall manifest me rightly." 

And when the incensed father, with his followers, breaks 
in upon him to claim his daughter back, amid the tumult 



448 LECTURE FOURTH. 



of torctes hurried Mther and thither^ and swords drawn 
by tlie friends of botli, the tranquil and commanding 
voixje of Othello rises above the angry elements : 

" Keep up your bright swords, for the dew will rust them. — 
Good signior, you shall more command with years 
Than with your weapons. 

Hold your hands, 
Both you of my inclining, and the rest. 
Were it my cue to fight, I should have known it 
Without a prompter." 

The hero of the tragedy is thus introduced — a man of 
heroic stamp, an intrepid soldier, honoured for faithful 
services to the Venetian State; the blood of kings is 
coursing in his veins, and the royalty of his birth and his 
martial experience are accompanied with a lofty spirit 
and a majestic self-command. But he has been first 
introduced by the ribaldry of lago, and hence the ima- 
gination is unhappily tempted to adopt one of those 
false impressions, which his filthy fancy delights in 
giving. 

The repulsive notion that Othello was a black* — a 
coarse-featured African — seems to me directly at variance 
with the requisitions of both poetry and history ; and I 
cannot but think it is an error which may be traced 
either to some false critical theory, or else more probably 
to the too literal interpretation of passages in the play — 
the unimaginative reading: which is fatal so often to the 



■* Coleridge handles this topic (of Othello's colour) in Literary Re- 
mains, vol. ii. p. 256. So in his Table Talk, p. 1 : " Othello must not 
be conceived as a negro, but a high and chivalrous Moorish chief. 
Shakspeare learned the spirit of the character from the Spanish poetry 
which was prevalent in England in his time." W. B. R. 



OTHELLO. 449 



spirit of poetry. The hero is styled "Othello the Moor f* 
such is his title and familiar designation throughout. He 
was one of that adventurous race of men who, striking 
out from the heart of Arabia, had made conquest of 
Persia and Syria; and, overturning the ancient sove- 
reignty of Egypt, swept in victory along the whole 
northern coast of Africa, and, passing thence across the 
narrow frith of the Mediterranean, scattered the dynasty 
of the Goths with Roderic at their head. In the most 
fertile region of Spain they built up an empire which 
lasted for centuries, and left behind them, for the wonder 
of remote generations, in the ruins of the Alhambra, a 
monument of the pomp of Saracenic civilization. More- 
over, it was the race that preserved the literature of Grreece 
— its philosophy and science — when Greece itself was pros- 
trate and benighted. Even after the power of the caliphs 
in their several realms began to decline, the Moors were 
the chosen and honoured captains of the armies of Chris- 
tian states. Especially was this the policy of the Vene- 
tian Republic, to lessen, it is said, by the employment of 
mercenary commanders, the danger of domestic intrigue. 
How true to his nature was it for Othello to stand in con- 
scious pride — the descendant of a race of kings — the 
representative of the Arabs who had been sovereigns 
in Europe — ^his spirit glowing with noble ancestral memo- 
ries ! And, on the other hand, how perfectly consistent 
it was with the debasing malignity of lago, and with the 
petulant disappointment of Roderigo, a foppish Venetian, 
to be blind to all that ennobled and dignified the Moorish 
name — to see no distinction between the chivalrous Moor, 
the chieftain of Christian armies, and the barbarous 

Ethiop — the despised slave. It was natural that vulgar 

29 



450 LECTURE FOURTH. 



words should be uttered from the lips of such men, and 
also that the parental phrensy of Desdemona's father 
shoi;ld find relief in the same strain of vituperative mis- 
representation — the propensity of a fresh and angry grief 
to magnify its injury. Such are the authorities which 
have led to the supposition that Othello was black. In 
one scene, indeed, he speaks so of himself: but it is 
when he is in lago's grasp — when his disordered spirit 
has begun to give food to his own suspicions. It is when 
he is " changing with the poison.^^ The agony of doubt 
has heaved over the lofty, complacent bearing of his hap- 
pier moments, and his speaking of himself as black is — 
what is very natural to such condition of mind — a piece 
of morbid exaggeration, just as when, in the same scene, 
he describes himself as — 

" Declined into the vale of years.'* 

On every account, it is better to clear the fancy of this 
false conception of Othello's colour — most of all for the 
sake of our sympathies with the gentle Desdemona; for, 
if we are brought to believe that this bright, this fair- 
faced, Venetian lady was wedded to a black, we should 
almost be tempted to think that the monstrous alliance 
was fitly blotted out in its fearful catastrophe. 

Shakspeare probably took his hero from the Spanish 
poetry of the times — a Moorish chieftain — one of the 
dark-complexioned guests, who were familiarly welcome 
in the houses of the Venetian nobles; and, being che- 
rished for illustrious public services, it was not difficult 
for the susceptible fancy of a woman to transfigure the 
shades upon the Moorish brow with the glory of the 
warrior's spirit. Perhaps, too, it was partly the poet's 



OTHELLO. 451 



purpose to show the transforming power of the passion of 
love — that magic which shows 

" Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt." 

The Moorish complexion of Othello — not intended to 
produce in our minds disgust at Desdemona's choice — is 
made to serve an important dramatic purpose, in that it 
greatly ministers to his suspicions of his wife's fidelity. 
It is the first unprompted argument for doubt — the first 
suggested by Othello's own thoughts, and, of course, 
quickly seized on and fomented by lago. It serves, too, 
to account for the extreme sensitiveness of Othello's 
sense of honour — that which is a prime element in his 
character. 

The careless interpretation of this tragedy has usually 
treated it as Shakspeare's exposition of the passion of 
jealousy.^ But, in Othello's composition, there is not an 
element of jealousy. Shakspeare has depicted jealous 
men in other of his plays, and nothing can be more 

* Coleridge was the first to deny the jealousy of Othello, (Literary 
Remains, vol. ii. p. 258, 266, and Table Talk, p. 1, 39.) Most of the 
critics have followed him. De Quincey, in a note to his Life and 
Manners, (Boston ed. p. 79,) says — "Mr. Coleridge has contended, 
and I think with truth, that the passion of Othello is no< jealousy. So 
much I know by report as the result of a lecture which he read at the 
Royal Institution. His arguments I did not hear. To me it is evi- 
dent that Othello's state of mind was not that of a degrading, suspi- 
cious rivalship; but the state of perfect misery arising out of this 
dilemma, the most affecting, perhaps, to contemplate of any which 
can exist, viz., the dire necessity of loving without limit one whom 
the heart pronounces to be unworthy and irretrievably sunk." To my 
mind, utterly repugnant as it is to all manner of paradoxical criticism, 
it seems, after all, that Falstaff teas a coward, and Othello teas jealous. 

W. B. R. 



452 LECTURE FOURTH. 



different from the Moor. Besides, jealousy is a little, a 
meaa passion — something which dwells in small minds, 
whereas all the passions of Othello are heroic and mag- 
nanimous. In his dying words, he was "not easily 
jealous;'^ and, indeed, even after lago has begun to 
torture his spirit, he, with perfect truth, disclaims the 
morbid apprehensiveness of jealousy: 

" *Tis not to make me jealous 
To say my wife is fair, feeds well, loves company, 
Is free of speech, sings, plays, and dances well ; 
Where virtue is, these are more virtuous : 
Nor from mine own weak merits will I draw 
The smallest fear, or doubt of her revolt; 
For she had eyes and chose me." 

Indeed, as if to show how imperturbable Othello is by 
the impulse of insufficient excitement and irritation, 
nothing can be more admirable than the unbroken calm 
he seems to dwell in during the early part of the play — 
the heroic repose of his spirit — his majestic self-possession, 
whether under the reproaches heaped upon him by one 
who is secure from his resentment, or even in the fresh 
fervour of his love for Desdemona. The military duty 
which interrupts his bridal days, is placidly welcomed 
with the cheerfulness of a soldier's spirit of self-sacrifice. 
The ship that bears Othello to Cyprus is tossed by a 
fearful tempest, ominous of the mightier tempest which 
soon was to heave his heart. When, after the brief inter- 
ruption of the voyage, he is once more welcomed by his 
wife, his swelling happiness gives itself freer utterance 
than he had yet indulged in. There is a sense of joy 
more than befits a mortal's portion, and therefore it is 
slightly darkened with what 8hakspeare often uses — a 



OTHELLO. 453 



presentiment that it can scarce endure — an apprehension 
sweetly echoed by a faint prayer from the more confiding 
heart of Desdemona. But the presentiment begins to be 
fashioned into a threatening reality; for a fiendlike eye is 
fastened on their bliss, and the heart is chilled by lago's 
sneer and his malignant menace : 

" Oh, you are well tuned now ! 
But I'll set down the pegs that make the music, 
As honest as I am." 

The first indication of the stormy elements^ which, by 
heroic discipline, have been taught to slumber in Othello's 
heart, is when he finds the midnight tranquillity of Cy- 
prus broken by the drunken brawl which lago had art- 
fully fomented. This wounds Othello's soldierly pride — 
his sense of honour ; and the hidden fires in his Moorish 
blood flash for the first time in high indignation at the 
disgraceful breach of discipline. The scene is note of 
preparation for the more appalling outbreak of the pas- 
sions of the Moor. 

The way being prepared, lago's work of destruction is 
accomplished with frightful rapidity ; and probably the 
most masterly scene in the whole range of dramatic lite- 
rature is that third scene of the third act, in which, with 
almost demoniac skill, he annihilates Othello's peace of 
mind forever. Four or five simple words from lago's 
lips — a slight exclamation, half-suppressed, but meant for 
Othello's ear — and the irretrievable mischief is begun : 
the poisoned shaft is shot. From that moment the hap- 
piness of the Moor is gone. But, throughout this scene, 
there is nothing of the excitability by inadequate causes, 
or of the eagerness to snatch at proofs, which are charac- 



LECTURE FOURTH. 



teristics of jealousy. On the contrary, the efforts of 
Othello are gigantic against the proofs, but they are 
forced upon his mind like demonstration : the bitterness 
of his agony is the unavoidable acquiescence, as, when 
almost speechlessly, he gives in to the first argument lago 
plies him with : 

''She did deceive her father marrying you 
Othello. And so she did." 

When lago finds him too much depressed by the first 
suggestions, he cheers him up with an affected bluntness 
of honesty and regret, in order that Othello's mind may 
recover energy enough to move forward to his destruc- 
tion — by its own force impelled by slight impulses. As 
when the Moor's disturbed thoughts begin to suggest 
reasons, such as his sense of the incongruous match, it is 
instantly seized on by lago — 

"Ay ! there's the point;" 

and a hundred-fold aggravated. Othello's mind is now 
tormented with a morbid activity — the restlessness almost 
of insanity — first a regret that he had married, and then 
the misery of his fierce resolve to cast her off: 

" If I do prove her haggard, 
Though that her jesses were my dear heart-strings, 
I'd whistle her off", and let her down the wind. 
To prey at fortune." 

When Desdemonda appears, the mere sight of her brings 
back for a moment his better nature, and there is a des- 
perate struggle to dismiss all doubt : 

"If she be false, 0, then, heaven mocks itself! 
I'll not believe it." 



OTHELLO. 455 



But the effort is a vain one, as lago well knew : 

" The Moor already changes with my poison. 
Dangerous conceits are, in their natures, poisons, 
Which, at the first, are scarce found to distaste ; 
But, with a little act upon the blood, 
Burn like the mines of sulphur. 

Not poppy, nor mandragora, 
Nor all the drowsy syrups of the world, 
Shall ever medicine thee to that sweet sleep 
Which thou ow'dst yesterday." 

The Moor's doubts have wrought him into a phrensy, and 
his thoughts, thus strongly impelled, go back to the glory 
of his martial life, and he feels that it must be obscured 
by his conjugal indignity. His soldier's spirit sinks 
within him, and this new sorrow speaks in that plaintive 
lament, which is heard like the sighing of the wind when 
its last low sounds are telling of a coming storm : 

" 0, now, forever 
Farewell, the tranquil mind ! farewell, content ! 
Farewell, the plumed troop, and the big wars, 
That make ambition virtue ! 0, farewell ! 
Farewell, the neighing steed, and the shrill trump, 
The spirit-stirring drum, the ear-piercing fife. 
The royal banner; and all quality. 
Pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war ! 
And, 0, you mortal engines, whose rude throats 
The immortal Jove's dread clamours counterfeit, 
Farewell ! Othello's occupation's gone !" 

The fiendish lago, knowing his power, pours the poison 
into Othello's heart with a bolder hand ; and then comes 
the meditation of revenge — the Moor's outraged honour 
crying aloud for vengeance. The contending emotions 
which make this agony are unconquered love and a new- 



456 LECTURE FOURTH. 



born hate. When the tempter, with hideous hypocrisy, 
counsels patience — 

"Never, lago. — Like to the Pontic sea, 
Whose icy current and compulsive course 
Ne'er feels retiring ebb, but keeps due on 
To the Propontic and the Hellespont; 
Even so my bloody thoughts, with violent pace, 
Shall ne'er look back, ne'er ebb to humble love, 
Till that a capable and wide revenge 
Swallow them up.'' 

His desperation is wrought by the collision of two 
sovereign passions. He struggles to hate, and yet loves 
as deeply to the very last. He boasts that his heart is 
turned to stone, and, at the same time, great streams of 
love come gushing from it. His suffering sense of 
honour, too, increases the misery. The conflict of the 
passions becomes even more tragic in the subsequent 
interview with the innocent one. Othello's stern heroism 
breaks into tears, and his bewildered wife seeks to soothe 
him in the tenderest strain of remonstrance : 

" Alas ! the heavy day ! why do you weep ? 
Am I the occasion of these tears, my lord ? 
If haply you my father do suspect 
An instrument of this your calling back. 
Lay not your blame on me; if you have lost him. 
Why I have lost him to." 

This calls forth, in a kind of self-communion rather than 
direct reply, the fullest expression of the anguish that 
was breaking Othello's heart — a sense of heroic honour 
fatally wounded, and a deep love blasted by the convic- 
tion of impurity : 



OTHELLO. 457 



" Had it pleased heaven 
To try me with affliction ; had he rain'd 
All kinds of sores and shames on my bare head; 
Steep'd me in poverty to the very lipsj 
Given to captivity me and my utmost hopes ; 
I should have found in some part of my soul 
A drop of patience : but, alas ! to make me 
A fixed figure for the time of scorn 
To point his slow unmoving finger at, — 
Yet could I bear that too; well, very well; 
But there where I have garner'd up my heart ; 
Where either I must live, or bear no life ; 
The fountain from the which my current runs, 
Or else dries up ; to be discarded thence ! 
Or keep it as a cistern for foul toads 
To knot and gender in ! 

*s V *!& Jj? 

0, thou weed. 
Who art so lovely fair, and smell'st so sweet. 
That the sense aches at thee, — would thou had'st ne'er been born !" 

A splendid contrast begins now to be dimly developed 
between the cbaracter of Othello and Desdemona. He 
has surrendered his generous and confiding spirit to the 
craft of a subtle intellect ; he has suffered himself to be 
betrayed out of the moral region of faith into the cold 
atmosphere of doubts and questionings and proofs. The 
sustaining principle of his nature has perished; for it is 
against his nature that convictions have overwhelmed 
him. But Desdemona, trusting to her own pure im- 
pulses, still clings to her faith j and, by virtue of it alone, 
in opposition to all that her senses and her understanding 
show her, she is wise as well as innocent. She will not 
believe even what she sees, but, with the most irresistible 
tenderness of conscious purity, invents excuses for her 
husband's violence : 



458 LECTURE FOURTH. 



" Something, sure, of state. 
Either from Venice, or some unhatch'd practice 
Made demonstrable here in Cyprus to him, 
Hath puddled his clear spirit ; and in such cases, 
Men's natures wrangle with inferior things, 
Though great ones are their object." 

She scarcely doubts her husband's righteousness, and 
only questions her own behaviour. The only complaint 
she utters is in no higher tone than this : 

" Those that do teach young babes, 
Do it with gentle means and easy tasks; 
He might have chid me so, for in good faith, 
I am a child to chiding." 

She seems to have no fear that, come what may, — 

" Though he do shake me oflF 
To beggarly divorcement," — 

her love can be weakened : 

"Unkindness may do much, 
And his unkindness may defeat my life. 
But never taint my love." 

lago has seen Othello wrought up to the highest pitch 
of phrensy— wildly crying for blood ; but this, he knows, 
will not answer his devilish purposes. It is_ necessary 
yet to work him into the calm resolve of deliberate ven- 
geance — the firmness of a judicial avenger ; and the skill 
with which this is accomplished is fearful to contemplate 
— to see how he makes Desdemona's attractions, and even 
virtues, plead against her. TThen the lingering affection 
of the Moor still betrays itself, lago tells him — 

" Xay, you must forget that." 



OTHELLO. 459 



And when^ against his darker will, he goes on recounting 
her graces, he is boldly told — 

"She's the worse for all this;" 

and Othello, as if reproaching himself for a momentary 
tenderness, wildly assents — 

*•' 0, a thousand, a thousand times !'* 

The feeling cannot be shaken away — 

" And then of so gentle a condition.'' 

Th^'s, too, is perverted into proof of guilt : 

'' Aj, too gentle." 

The profound emotion with which assent is wrung from 

the helpless Moor is, perhaps, the finest touch of pathos 

in the tragedy : 

" Nay, that's certain : 
But yet the pity of it, lago ! — 
0, lago, the pity of it, lago I" 

The tumultuous passions which have agitated the ago- 
nized Othello, almost subside into a sense of justice — the 
awful sternness of composure with which he is about to 
render up an expiation for his injured honour. 

The only being whose spotless purity endures is the 
injured Desdemona. The violent elements rage around 
her without spoiling her innocence. She shrinks even 
from the sound of the coarse words that wound her ear, 
and it is inimitably touching when she appeals to lago 

himself : 

"Am I that name, lago? 
lago. What name, fair lady ? 
Des. Such as she says my lord did say I was." 

Desdemona is preserved innocent, for she is a sacrifice — 



460 LECTURE FOURTH. 



a victim without blemisli — meek and unresisting. It is 
as sucli that Othello approaches her to execute her doom : 

" It is the cause, it is the cause, my soul, — 
Let me not name it to you, you chaste stars ! — 
It is the cause. — Yet I'll not shed her blood : 
Nor scar that whiter skin of hers than snow, 
And smooth as monumental alabaster. 
Yet she must die." 

The fierce Moor is again all tenderness, even in his dire 
determination. Weeping over Desdemona — ^his sleep- 
ing, unconscious wife, he is impressed with a sacrificial 

solemnity : 

"I must weep, 
But they are cruel tears : This sorrow's heavenly; 
It strikes where it doth love." 

The plot which, by the simplest means, had been en- 
tangled so intricately, is unwoven by means as simple. 
The fall of a handkerchief had been all the machinery* 
— that handkerchief of which Othello, terrifying the ima- 
gination of his wife, told her — 

" There's magic in the web of it : 
A sibyl, tkat had number'd in the world 
The sun to make two hundred compasses, 
In her prophetic fury sew'd the work : 
The worms were hallow'd that did breed the silk, 
And it was dyed in mummy, which the skilful 
Conserved of maidens' hearts," — 



* "Schiller has the material sublime; to produce an effect, he sets 
you a whale town on fire, and throws infants, with their mothers, into 
the flames, or locks up a father in an old tower. But Shakspeare 
drops a handkerchief, and the same or greater effects follow." Cole- 
ridge's Table Talk, p. 2. W. B. R. 



OTHELLO. 461 



that handkerchief, the thought of which, in Cassio's 
hands, recalled by lago, struck the last hope from 
Othello's heart : 

" Oh, it comes o'er my memory, 
As doth the raven o'er the infected house, 
Boding to all." 

And now the whole truth is revealed to the misguided 
Othello, by the few words of Emilia : 

" thou dull Moor ! that handkerchief thou speak'st of, 
I found by fortune, and did give my husband." 

The sense of misery and the sense of justice bid Othello 
most willingly make his own life forfeit to the same hand 
which had destroyed the innocent one. There only re- 
mains a little faint questioning of lago, " why he hath 
thus ensnared both soul and body" — a little excusing 
of himself — 

" For nought I did in hate, but all in honour," — 

a little heart-broken pleading for his memory — his sol- 
dier's memory for services done to the state, but yet more 
for his conjugal memory — to be spoken of as 

" One that loved not wisely, but too well : 
Of one not easily jealous, but, being wrought, 
Perplex'd in the extreme ; of one whose hand, 
Like the base Judean, threw a pearl away 
Richer than all his tribe ; of one, whose subdued eyes. 
Albeit unused to the melting mood. 
Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees 
Their medicinal gum."* 



* After the delivery of this lecture, Jt flashed upon me that there is 
an inimitable and most pathetic beauty in the dying Moor's allusion 



462 LECTURE FOURTH. 



This sad tragedy was never meant to give an admoni- 
tion so superficial as to warn against the evil of jealousy. 
The moral of Shakspeare's dramas always lies deeper, 
because they are works of pure imagination — the noblest 
faculty of the human mind. There may be discovered 
in this tragedy the loftiest moral that poetry ever sha- 
dowed forth — the victory of faith. When Othello was 
tempted to cast his faith from out his heart, his whole 
nature was given over to misery and desperation and 
guilt — he lost the inward spiritual principle which was 
the very life of his moral being. But Desdemona clung 
to her faith, and it kept her heart in its perfect integrity 
and innocence — even tbrough all her sorrows and to the 
last moment of consciousness on her fearful death-bed. 
Comparatively, she was happy; for the chief sufferer 
was the faith-bewildered Othello. 



This course of lectures, through which you have so 
kindly followed me, has comprehended only the subject 
of tragic poetry; and, although King Lear, Macbeth, 
Hamlet, and Othello afford illustrations as varied as need 
be desired, yet they have been no more than varieties of 
terror and pity and sorrow ; and, dwelling thus upon sad 
emotions alone, I have not been without a fear that you 



to "the Arabian trees." What perfect poetic truth it is ! — the mind, 
by one of its almost supematurally quickened processes, is travelling 
far back to the land of bis birth and the home of his childhood. 

It famishes, too, another proof of Othello's veritable Moorish blood. 

H. R. 



OTHELLO. 463 



might be craving some relief in having your thoughts so 
exclusively directed to the dismal side of humanity. 
Indeed, it would inspire a happy feeling, and finely would 
it show the universality of the poet's genius, if we could 
have suddenly turned our attention to the bright side of 
that world which Shakspeare has created; to delve in the 
inexhaustible mine of Falstaff's wit, and find the genuine 
ore of his joyous philosophy and humour; to speed in 
fancy into the fairy realm of Ariel and Oberon, or to fol- 
low the light-hearted Eosalind through the sunny, shady 
glades of the forest of Arden. But the scope of my 
course was necessarily confined to " poetry in its deepest 
earnest," and to trace the moral which tragedy imagi- 
natively teaches — 

" That there is often found 
In mournful thoughts, and always might be found, 
A power to virtue friendly -" 

those mournful thoughts not to be spent in luxurious, 
sentimental dreaminess, but to be taken up into our 
actions; for, let me say, there is no more insidious 
temptation than the self-delusion of sentimentality ; it is 
not only worthless as a principle of action, but it may co- 
exist with a deplorable hardening of the heart. 

I have followed the moral teachings of a poet in those 
tragedies, which serve to show the salutary influences of 
sorrow ; and the lessons of history give further confirma- 
tion. For what does history tell of half so much as of 
suffering ? If science teaches that this earth of ours is a 
glittering planet, the records of history as surely teach, 
that it rolls on stained with blood and with tears. So has 
it ever been, and the pages of history which impress us 



464 LECTURE FOURTH. 



most deeply are its tragedies. In all the annals of the 
ancient dynasty of Egypt, what is there like that tragic 
midnight moment, when all the first-horn of the land were 
smitten — " from the first-born of Pharaoh that sat on his 
throne unto the first-born of the captive that was in the 
dungeon?'^ The chronicles of Babylon have perished, 
and we bear in mind only that tragic hour, when there 
came forth the fingers of a man, and wrote upon the 
palace wall the prophecy of an empire's doom. Turn to 
classic story, and what rises up to the memory more 
readily than the sacrifice in the tragic pass of Thermo- 
pylae ? Come to the annals of our fatherland, and where 
have they a deeper interest, than when the career of King 
Charles — ^him who had been the companion of the loose 
and profligate Villiers — him who had broken the cove- 
nant of the constitution — turned into tragedy, when gloom 
was gathering over his fortunes, from the day on which 
the royal standard was raised at Nottingham only to be 
ominously cast down in a stormy and unruly night, until 
at length he made a bloody atonement on the scafibld ; 
and, as his corpse was borne to an unnoted grave, with 
no other funeral rite than silent loyalty, snow fell drearily 
but purely upon the black pall that covered his coffin ?* 

Thus it is that history, as well as poetry, shows what 
has been finely called '^ the power and divinity of suffer- 
ing.'^ There is a moral interest in spots sacred to sorrow 
which grandeur cannot boast of; and a thoughtful travel- 
ler has thus expressed the feeling on visiting the palace 



* " The king's body was laid in the grave without any words, or 
other ceremonies than the tears and sighs of a few beholders." Cla- 
rendon, b. xi. W. B. R. 



OTHELLO. 4C5 



of the doges at Venice : — ^'It is a strange building, with 
its multitudinous little marble columns and grotesque 
windows, and the Griant Staircase all glorious of the purest 
Carrara marble, carved and chiselled into ornaments of 
the most beautiful minuteness. A splendid palace indeed 
it is : yet, while my eye wandered in a few minutes over 
the gorgeous part of the structure, it was long riveted 
with undiminished interest upon the little round holes 
close to the level of the sullen canal beneath the Bridge 
of Sighs : holes which marked the dungeons beneath the 
level of the canal, where, for years, the victims of that 
wicked merchant republic were confined. * * * 

^' And why is it that suffering should have a spell to fix 
the eye above the power of beauty or of greatness ? Is it 
because the cross is a religion of suffering — a faith of suf- 
fering — a privilege of suffering — a perfection arrived at 
by and through suffering only ? Half an hour was enough 
for the Ducal Palace. I could gaze for hours upon those 
dungeon-holes, gaze and read there, as in an exhaustless 
volume, histories on histories of silent, weary suffering, as 
it filed the soft heart of man away, attenuated his reason 
into a dull instinct, or cracked the stout heart as you 
would shiver a flint. ****** 

'■'' There is seldom a line of glory written upon the 
earth^s face, but a line of suffering runs parallel with it ; 
and they that read the lustrous syllables of the one, and 
stoop not to decipher the spotted and worn inscription 
of the other, get the least half of the lesson earth has to 



* Faber's Sights and Thoughts in Foreign Churches and among 
Foreign Peoples, pp. 285, 288. 

30 



466 LECTURE FOURTH. 



To ttese reflections, let me add what a poet has written 
to teach that, in this mortal life, we have before us not 
only the duty of action, but the more neglected, yet in- 
evitable, duty of suffering : 

" Great actions move our admiration, chiefly 
Because they carry in themselves an earnest 
That we can suffer greatly. 
Action is transitory — a step, a blow, 
The motion of a muscle — this way or that — 
'Tis done, and in the after vacancy 
We wonder at ourselves like men betrayed : 
Suffering is permanent, obscure, and dark, 
And shares the nature of infinity. 
Yet through the darkness (infinite though it seem, 
And irremovable) gracious openiiiSgs lie. 
By which the soul with patient steps of thought, 
Now toiling, wafted now on wings of prayer. 
May pass in hope ; and, though from mortal bonds 
Yet undeliver'd, rise with sure ascent 
Even to the fountain-head of peace divine,"* 

I have, I fear, consumed more than an appropriate por- 
tion of your time, and it would, therefore, be ungracious 
to encroach on it longer; but it would be yet more un- 
gracious not to take one moment more, to say how much 
I have felt the attention which has been given so kindly 
to my subject. 

* These lines are from Wordsworth, the first ten being from his 
tragedy, " The Borderers." 



THE END. 



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